Eastern Front: Zombie Crusade IV

by J. W. Vohs

  In spite of some desperate fighting and heavy casualties, the railroad-link had been established. Soon after, grain and military advisors began flowing west while medical supplies, fighters, and beef came east. Now, a limited harvest was taking place in northern Indiana fields protected by Mormon troops while combines were operated by surviving farmers. The alliance had been cemented in blood, and Jack knew that with western help, America had a chance of surviving the deadliest virus in history.

  In his heart, Jack believed that eventually the humans would win their war against the infected and resettle the best locations on the continent, but hoping to utilize existing infrastructure after they did so was a pipe-dream. Every major American metropolitan area had likely burned shortly after succumbing to the virus due to unmitigated natural gas explosions, electrical fires, and whatever else causes falling cities to incinerate. Roads and bridges still stood for the most part, but Jack knew that nature would quickly reclaim them without the constant maintenance a nation of hundreds of millions had once provided.

  The history professor knew that in many ways the collapse of society had tossed the survivors back to the 19th Century, at least as far as transportation was concerned. The rivers and Great Lakes would be critical to the success of the war and subsequent rebuilding efforts. The hunters were afraid of deep water, and the country was full of boats of every shape and size imaginable. From canoes to great barges, the rivers could be used to safely move people and goods throughout the eastern and middle parts of the nation. On the Great Lakes, tens of thousands of watercraft ranging from fishing boats to ocean-going freighters were sitting in ports just waiting for people to use them again. Jack was willing to save the bridges that could be kept without endangering his people, but with few exceptions, he would destroy the spans if they were of any potential use to the enemy. He would fight to keep the railroad bridges along the Union Pacific line, but beyond those he considered the structures expendable.

  Jack felt the chopper land a split second before Todd barked, “Go, go, go!”

  The night was dark and unseasonably cold, with a half-moon intermittently blocked by clouds. All of the soldiers, including the men in the cockpit, wore high-quality NVGs that allowed them to easily view the landing site as they approached. Neither Todd nor the pilot reported seeing any hunters before the men pulled off their headsets and jumped out, but Luke, Bobby, and Marcus immediately set up a defensive perimeter with their backs to the river. Jack, Carter, and David pulled out all of their gear as quickly as possible; the SOAR inflatable rafts and two bellows-style air pumps were the last items removed. Jack gave Todd a thumbs-up signal, and the Blackhawk lifted from the mud and headed toward the small hills at low speed.

  As soon as the Blackhawk pilot reached the far edge of the flood plain, he began executing slow turns above the trees that gradually took the helicopter further and further away from the drop-site. The men hoped that any hunters in the surrounding countryside would be attracted to the sound of the rotors and follow the chopper’s route inland. Also, the noise created by the Blackhawk would help mask any sounds Jack and his crew made as they inflated the watercraft and loaded them with gear.

  Problems began when one of the pumps, which were each operated by foot, inexplicably cracked open and would no longer hold air. The raft was about halfway filled when the pump died, leaving David to wait for the first boat to finish with nothing to do in the meantime but add his eyes to those keeping watch over the site. The sounds of the Blackhawk were fading when he heard a splash upstream, turning just in time to see a small pack of hunters trotting single-file along the bank of the river. He quickly estimated their numbers at seven, and then looked over to make sure that Luke, on the eastern edge of the three-man defensive perimeter, had heard the commotion as well.

  Fighters all over the country had learned the hard way that close-combat with the hunters while wearing NVGs was downright perilous. In any sort of a scrum in which humans relied upon hand-held weapons and their armor to protect them in close combat, there was a very real threat of having the goggles pulled off by a grasping flesh-eater, leading to momentary blindness. A moment of indecision was usually all the hunters needed to take a soldier down, and Carter had lost a number of seasoned veterans in the Chicago train yards when a large gathering of infected had managed to ambush them at close range. David decided to pull his goggles off, but noticed that Luke was keeping his on as he quickly strung his bow. For the moment the clouds had drifted away from the half-moon now glittering off the relatively calm river, so David planned to use the reflective surface of the water to silhouette the creatures as he took aim with the Trajicon sights on his silenced .22 pistol.

  As usual, Luke struck first as an arrow slithered through the night and punched through the forehead of the lead hunter. The monster fell silently, dead before it hit the ground and dropping so quickly that the second beast in the column stumbled over the corpse just as David pulled his trigger. The subsonic round swooshed over the falling hunter and hit the third flesh-eater in the mouth, knocking out teeth before exiting the fleshy part of the neck and leaving an angry monster still very much in the fight. The wounded beast howled in pain and hunger as it finally saw a human standing twenty paces ahead of him. The eerie roar was cut off by another of Luke’s arrows passing through the injured hunter’s eye socket, but even as David efficiently dispatched two more of the creatures with successive shots, he heard an answering call from the foothills ring out over the river valley.

  With little need for silence now, Bobby and Marcus quickly cut down the remaining pack members with their M-4s. The possibility of remaining undetected was now irrevocably lost; the team’s only hope from this point would be speed and efficiency. Jack and Carter had finished inflating the first raft and moved on to the second, at which point David and Marcus switched from perimeter security to loading gear and supplies into the boat that was ready to go. As they began the work, they heard Bobby open fire with his M-4 again, but Luke’s silence indicated that he was sticking with his medieval weapons. That meant that the flesh-eaters were close, and added even more urgency to the work being done on the watercraft.

  Luke was thankful that Bobby had thinned out the pack heading his way from the east before turning to face the group closing in on their western flank. Now Luke only faced seven hunters instead of ten. Any other human still living in the world would have been offering up final prayers as the frenzied pack rushed to within twenty meters of their prey, but the teen warrior calmly released an arrow which he watched fly through the open mouth and spinal column of a roaring monster even as another shaft was being nocked. Luke was surprised to see the next arrow smack into the face of a large hunter without passing through, but the broad-head had obviously reached the brain because the monster collapsed in a heap a mere ten meters from the archer’s feet.

  The young but extremely experienced fighter seamlessly switched weapons, dropping the bow while pulling his trench axe in one fluid movement. With no time to swing, Luke dropped his shoulder and flipped the first hunter to reach him head over heels. He then used a vicious uppercut with the blade-side of the axe to lop off the top of the second flesh-eater’s head while side-stepping an attempted tackle by the third member of the pack to reach his position. With two hunters still alive behind him, Luke flipped the trench-axe into a two-handed grip and deftly slid the pointed tip into the path of the fourth beast, the creature’s forward momentum causing it to be impaled right between its black, furious eyes.

  Luke knew he didn’t have time to yank the weapon free, choosing instead to pull his combat knife as he ducked the grab of the final hunter in the group. As the flesh-eater stumbled past his vanishing quarry, the teen stabbed the monster in the back of the head with the Gerber dagger, losing his grip on the weapon when it became stuck in the skull of the falling creature. Luke didn’t like to rely on his guns, mostly because he didn’t practice with them much and he was such a natural with his bow. But with no other choice,
he pulled his silenced .22 to deal with the remaining two hunters who’d regained their footing and were now snarling in frustration and hunger as they rushed him. The young warrior calmly allowed the first monster to bury its teeth in his forearm, confident that the Kevlar-reinforced leather would prevent anything more than a bruise from the bite as he shot the second hunter through the face. Then he stuck the barrel of the pistol in the eye of the beast tearing at his arm and scrambled its brains with a final pull of the trigger.

  More howls were echoing around the team as Luke retrieved his weapons after making sure that Bobby was all right. He needn’t have worried about the former Ranger who’d only missed twice with his AR as he’d dropped eight hunters beyond pistol range. Luke briefly considered the fact that he and two other members of his team had just killed almost thirty hunters in less than five minutes, knowing it hadn’t been easy, but still having trouble remembering when it had been difficult. He knew that fighters armored according to Jack’s specifications had been killed by the hunters, and not just a few. But in general, those who were slain had been buried beneath a mob of flesh-eaters who’d managed to find an unprotected patch of skin with their teeth before a rescue was possible. Some soldiers, including Carter, had actually survived such mobbings and lived to tell about them. The probability that North American humans had been over ninety percent depopulated in less than a month proved the deadly effectiveness of the infected in acquiring the protein they craved. Still, Luke mused, as long as Jack’s fighters had flank protection, or faced only a few hunters at a time, they were leather and iron death to the creatures.

  Jack and Carter had finished inflating the second raft and were quickly stowing the remaining supplies and equipment as David called for Luke and Bobby to join them at the river’s edge. With howls erupting from numerous points to the north, David didn’t have to call a second time; the veteran Ranger came running up just behind his teen comrade as fast as his aging legs would carry him. The team didn’t waste any time getting on the water, with Luke and David each piloting a raft as the rest of the team kept watch on the Kentucky shore.

  Every member of the team felt as if the night was nearly over by the time they were finally able to start the electric motors and head down the Ohio River, but real time didn’t match their mental fatigue, nor their instincts. The men’s watches didn’t lie, and with the hands pointing to midnight Jack and the others knew that they had more than enough hours of darkness remaining to reach the bridge near Brandenburg and recon the area. With fully charged batteries powering the quiet, electric motors propelling the military-grade inflatables they were using, and their progress reinforced by the river’s strong current, they reached the town in just under two hours.

  The bridge lay west of Brandenburg, with the Kentucky shoreline heavily wooded for about a half-mile between the town and the structure crossing the Ohio. In the lead boat, Jack ordered Luke to hug the bank as they neared the bridge, eventually deciding to go ashore about three hundred meters east of the massive span. As soon as the rafts were secured and everyone was ready for action, Jack told Marcus and David to guard the boats and their cargo while he led the others toward their objective.

  Autumn had arrived early in the Midwest, so early that frost had appeared in the first week of September in Fort Wayne. Daytime temperatures stayed in the high forties and fifties for the rest of the month, even after the initial cold spell broke. Utah still maintained a weather monitoring and forecasting facility, and the news they shared wasn’t good for survivors now learning to live without electricity and natural gas for heat. The western meteorologists were reporting that with so much ash and debris pushed into the atmosphere during the mass conflagrations in the world’s cities following the outbreak, global temperatures would be at least ten to fifteen degrees cooler than normal for more than a year.

  Several light snowfalls had already occurred in Fort Wayne, and daily highs in the thirties had become commonplace as September gave way to early October. Jack knew little about meteorology, but he had spent enough time outside over the years to know that early autumn in Indiana was usually full of sixty degree days that many people used to observe the beautiful Midwest foliage. This year the leaves were long gone, most of them on the ground well before the first official day of Fall arrived. The engineers pushing their precious cargoes along the Union Pacific rail line between Utah and Chicago had already encountered several blizzards on the high plains, with sub-zero temperatures being recorded west of Omaha.

  What these weather developments meant for Jack and his team in northern Kentucky was a ground already covered with crunchy leaves, and much of the foliage they ordinarily could have used as cover was now shriveled and bare. Nevertheless, the men felt they needed darkness for this mission. They moved as rapidly as possible through the noisy forest, trusting the wind blowing along the river channel to mask the sounds they were making as they approached the bridge. Finally they reached a place where they could view the structure with their field glasses, so everyone took a few minutes to observe the area from slightly different positions before sharing what they had been able to see with one another. All of the soldiers had spotted the enemy Blackhawk sitting on the road at the point where it met the bridge. On the span itself sat a large SUV turned sideways, with at least three people camping behind the vehicle. The truth was undeniable: Barnes’ scouts held the crossing.

  The first thing Christy saw as the world slowly emerged from darkness was the concerned face of Dr. Vickie Martinez leaning over her. “What happened?” Christy groaned as she tried to sit up.

  “My best guess is that your blood sugar is out of whack,” Vickie replied, handing her a packet of glucose gel. “Eat this.”

  Christy waved it away. “That doesn’t look like food, and your official diagnosis sounds less than scientific.”

  “Would you prefer an IV? I suppose that’s a more scientific way to boost your blood sugar.”

  Christy grabbed the packet. “So why do you think this goo will be good for me?”

  Gracie cut in playfully, “What’s the matter—are you afraid this stuff isn’t on David’s pre-approved food list?”

  “I should never tell anyone anything,” Christy grumbled.

  “As your doctor I have to respectfully disagree.” Vickie packed a few small items back in her bag and reached down to help Christy up into a chair. “Knowing that you haven’t been eating or drinking, that you’re pregnant, and that diabetes runs in your family, led me to check your blood sugar while you were passed out. I’m your mom’s doctor too, you know, and she has me check her blood sugars regularly.”

  “I can go get some real food, and some bottled waters,” Gracie offered.

  “That would be very helpful,” Vickie replied. “I’ll stay here with Christy until you get back, and the rest of you can go about your business. Our so-called clinic is just a few doors down, but I’m confident that Mrs. Smith won’t be requiring any additional medical services this evening.”

  When everyone had gone, Christy turned to Vickie and coolly stated, “I’m glad we have a little time alone. I have a few questions for you.”

  Vickie sounded genuinely concerned, “Are you worried about the baby? You’ve got nothing—”

  Christy cut her off. “It’s not about the baby. It’s about David. I know that something has him distracted, I know that he’s been talking to you, and I know that you brought him some sort of news last night during the meeting. You have to tell me, is there something wrong with David?”

  “No, lord no, as far as I know David is as healthy as a horse.”

  “Then what have you two been talking about? What information did you have that was so important that it couldn’t wait until after the planning meeting?” Christy narrowed her eyes. “I know all about doctor-patient confidentiality, we lawyers have a similar thing with our clients. I don’t care about that right now—you have to tell me what’s going on.”

  “All I can tell you is that you don’t
have to worry about David,” Vickie tried to sound reassuring, but her growing discomfort was obvious.

  Christy pounced. “So I don’t have to worry about David—who do I have to worry about? What secret are you and my husband keeping from me? Is my mother ill? Is that it?”

  “No, your mother is fine—”

  “Ah, my mother is fine, but you admit there’s a secret.”

  Vickie was growing increasingly flustered. “I didn’t say that!”

  “You didn’t have to. But I’ll give you the chance. Look me in the eye and swear on all that you hold holy—God, your husband, your children—that you and David aren’t keeping something from me.”

  Vickie had always been a terrible liar, but she hoped that she could get by Christy on a technicality. “I swear, David and I aren’t keeping anything from you specifically.” Christy leaned back and smiled, and Vickie allowed herself a premature sigh of relief.

  Christy cocked her head to one side and gazed directly into Vickie’s eyes. “Then I’m sure you won’t mind trusting me with whatever you two have been keeping to yourselves. Or are more people in on it? Does this have anything to do with the trip?”

  “No, not really. Look, Christy, I wish I could tell you, but it’s not really my business or yours. Can’t you just trust me?”

  “Can’t you just trust me?” Christy retorted. “I can promise that what you say to me won’t leave this room. Knowing that you and my husband share a secret is stressful to me, and as my doctor you know that stress is not good for me, especially in my delicate condition.”

  Vickie laughed, “I wish I could have seen you in action in a courtroom. You are relentless.” She was quiet for a minute as she considered what to say next. “All right, but you need to swear to me that nothing I tell you will leave this room. I made a promise to David, and you of all people should want me to honor that, but the truth is I really could use someone to talk to.”