“Come on, let’s move, let’s go!” Sullivan shouted, as the divers grunted and heaved the weight of the warhead out of the boat and up the ramp towards the waiting truck.
“What’s the rush?” I said. The adrenaline was beginning to wear off, leaving me giddy with survivor’s euphoria. “It’s over. We fucking won!”
“A hundred men,” Sergeant Blake reminded me grimly. “You think there were a hundred men on those boats? It’s not over until we’re airborne, Matt.”
“Oh,” I said. “Right. Well, yeah, let’s get the fuck out of here, then.”
I couldn’t say I’d miss the place.
I followed the others up towards the truck – an Army vehicle, big and heavy, camouflage canvas over the back of a huge tray. Even with the deaths in the boats, there were still about thirty of us, a mix of clearance divers and sailors and soldiers and civilians. The last survivors of the HMAS Canberra. I thought of all those people I’d seen in the cafeteria every day – all those soldiers and their families and friends, unexpectedly airlifted to safety from besieged Army bases in New South Wales. I thought of the kids. I thought of Commodore Norton, sitting behind his desk, his office walls adorned with photos of men in uniform. I thought of the HMAS Canberra – a huge and powerful ship in its own right, a floating fortress, the pride of the Royal Australian Navy – resting now on the seabed, alongside the USS Abraham Lincoln. And for what?
I turned to look at the last remaining Tiger, hovering menacingly above the bay like a malevolent dragon, still lit up with the last light of the sun even as the ocean below it turned cold and dark. As the adrenaline wore off I felt a bitterness taking hold of my heart. I’d seen people turn against each other before. I had no illusions, not after Manjimup, not after Kalgoorlie, not after Mundrabilla.
But this? This was something else. A whole military, all the training and camaraderie and honour and medals and symbolism – and less than a year later, here they were, shooting at people they were supposed to be fighting alongside. Shooting at people they probably had fought alongside, not so long ago, in Afghanistan or Iraq or even the zombie-choked city evacuations on our own soil.
The buzz of the attack chopper thrummed out across the bay, hovering, waiting. I wanted to tear it apart. I wanted to murder the pilot inside it and I wanted to rend its metal into scraps. I wanted to go to New England and kill everyone there.
“Matt!” Sergeant Blake yelled. “Get your arse into gear!”
The truck was loaded, and our motley band of survivors was piling inside. We couldn’t all fit. Four RAAF men were crammed into the driver’s compartment; twenty of our own managed to squeeze into the back alongside the nuke. That left ten of us standing on the running boards on either side of the truck, five on each side, clinging to the canvas.
As soon as our boots were off the ground, the driver hit the accelerator, the truck grumbling to life and lurching through the gates into the airport. Nobody bothered to close them behind us – the RAAF ground crew intended to abandon the outpost and fly off with us, I guess, in light of the circumstances. I found myself on the right-hand side of the vehicle, at the very front by the driver’s window, Rahvi right behind me.
Up ahead, as we lurched out onto the tarmac, picking up speed, I could see the Globemaster. It was at the far end of the runway, the loading ramp open and ready to receive its precious cargo. Glancing back, I could see the Tiger creeping after us, crossing over the airport fence. It still kept its distance – Flying Officer Kemeny had climbed into the back of the truck last, still aiming his missile launcher, still warding it off.
“Oh, you’re fucking kidding me!” Rahvi suddenly yelled.
I turned away from the chopper, looking ahead of us again. Off to our right, only a couple hundred metres away, was the sturdy chainlink fence that surrounded the airport – a handful of zombies scattered along its length, an industrial district of service roads and smash repair shops behind them.
In the gathering dusk, huge headlights were roaring down that road alongside the fence. Even at this distance, even over the sound of the Army truck’s diesel engine, I could hear a powerful rumbling and roaring. The glare of the lights hid exactly what it was, but as it reached a pair of gates and turned through them, smashing them aside like they were tinfoil and crushing a few hapless zombies beneath its wheel, I saw it.
An APC. A big, thick, heavy, eight-wheeled personnel carrier, painted olive and green, bristling with antenna and coated in armour, and topped off with an enormous gun turret. Not an Army tank, exactly, but the next best thing.
Behind it came another pair of trucks; not APCs but bulky, ugly utility vehicles with high clearances and heavy machine guns mounted on top. I’d seen some at Wagga Wagga – Bushmasters, I think they were called. We’d passed the gates a moment ago, but the APC and the Bushmasters were on an intercept course for us, chewing up the tarmac, coming towards us from a four o’clock position.
“Hostile vehicles!” Rahvi yelled past me, into the driver’s compartment. “Take evasive action! Get us past those hangars, if you can!”
I drew the Browning from my holster – with one hand clinging to the truck’s canvas, the M4 wasn’t an option. A handgun wasn’t going to do anything against an APC, but I could aim for the Bushmasters, and maybe if I got lucky I could puncture a tyre or hit the turret gunners…
I emptied the clip slowly and carefully. Some of my shots pinged uselessly off the Bushmasters’ armour; others may as well have been blanks. The others were shooting too, whether they were clinging to the side of the truck or sitting in the back, propping their rifles up on the tray. Nothing happened – New England’s vehicles charged on as the bullets pinged off their armour. We may as well have been tossing popcorn at them.
There was a sudden whoosh of heat and fire – a cry from the people in the back of the truck – and a contrail of white smoke shot out from the back towards the pursuing vehicles. It slammed into one of the Bushmasters and there was a spectacular explosion, lighting up the gloom of the dusk with a sudden fireball, the shell of the truck flipping over and tumbling along the concrete. I hoped like hell that Kemeny had more rounds in that thing.
We’d veered off the runway now, seeking shelter amongst the hangars and scattered, derelict planes, the driver weaving between them to try to get us out of our pursuers’ line of fire. And now, for the first time, they did open fire – both the APC cannon and the .50 cal on top of the remaining Bushmaster taking quick bursts at us, huge heavy sounds like artillery. But they were being cautious, trying to take out our tyres, not risking the nuke; and they’d never been designed for that kind of precision. The bullets chipped away harmlessly at the tarmac around us.
The Bushmaster came closer, even as we swung between ranks of parked Cessnas, rusting away in the subtropical weather. In a heartbeat it was right alongside us, the gunner swivelling his turret around, so close I could see his mullet sticking out from beneath his helmet. I was still trying to reload my Browning with one hand, but Rahvi and Blake levelled their handguns at him and opened fire. A difficult shot, with both vehicles weaving in and out of the ranks of parked planes – but they were SAS. A moment later he was slumped over the gun.
Elation turned to shock as I realised the Bushmaster was about to ram us – with me, Rahvi, and everybody else clinging to the side of the truck caught in the middle. But the RAAF driver saw it coming, squeezed the brakes, and as the Bushmaster lurched towards us he dropped back, let the New Englanders overshoot us, and cut down between two hangars.
The APC was still hot on our tail, and a second later we were past the hangars, past the parked planes, out in the open again with the tarmac rushing past beneath our feet. The other end of the airport and the waiting Globemaster seemed like a million miles away. “We can’t hold them off forever!” I shouted.
“We don’t need to!” Rahvi yelled. “Just till the plane!”
I glanced ahead. The glass-walled terminal lay between us and the Globemaster, and th
e driver was veering around it, as fast as he could, weaving between the support pillars for plane connection tunnels. The APC was firing again, the heavy calibre bullets churning up the concrete behind us.
We hit a baggage cart with a glancing blow, suitcases and clothing exploding onto us. A business shirt whipped up in the wind and plastered itself across my face; I holstered the Browning and reached up to pull it away.
That must have been it – I was distracted, it was unexpected. That was why I wasn’t ready for the swerve.
Such a stupid thing. Such a small thing. After everything we’d already been through. The truck had been swerving plenty, but I’d been able to brace for it. In that one moment, as I pulled the shirt away from my face, I was blind. And I didn’t anticipate it.
The truck took a hard corner around another baggage cart. I didn’t expect it. I lost my grip.
I fell.
The ground hit me hard. Like every blow, every punch, every injury I received since the start of this year, all balled up into one, knocking the wind out of me. I instinctively tried to shield my face, but there’s not much you can do to make tumbling off a vehicle onto concrete much easier on you.
I eventually came to a halt, with gashes and grazes on my arms and face, unable to breathe. I’d ended up facing down, almost on my knees, elbows pressed against the concrete as well. I flopped onto my side. The APC had roared right past me, followed not long after by the Bushmaster. The sound of the gunfire being exchanged was fading into the distance. Now there was only quiet, and the sharp world of pain singing in my blood. In a minute, I knew, I’d feel overwhelming panic. I was lost. I was fucked. I was gone. But for now, the pain was washing over all.
A few moments later I heard footsteps, boots sprinting along the tarmac, somebody dropping down alongside me.
“Matt!” It was Rahvi. “Are you okay? Matt, talk to me!”
I choked out a ragged exhalation, then drew air back into my lungs. Rahvi had a hand on my shoulder, and he helped me stumble to my feet. “Any broken bones?” he asked.
“I’m okay,” I choked. “I think I’m okay.” I squinted up at him. “You fell too?”
“No – no, I jumped, when I saw you go. Come on. We have to move.”
“Move?” I croaked. “We’re fucked. The plane won’t wait for us.”
“We’ve got a shortcut,” Rahvi said, nodding off to our side.
I saw what he meant immediately. A stone’s throw away was the huge, glass-walled main terminal: the locus point of the entire airport. The truck had been forced to go around it, but the Globemaster was right on the other side. If we went straight through, we might make it first, even on foot.
“Come on!” Rahvi urged, clapping me on the back. I staggered forward, breaking into a jog, then a sprint – adrenaline overriding pain.
I pulled my M4 from my back, but the fall from the truck had cracked the barrel. I pulled the magazine out – that might still be handy – and tossed the rifle away. My legs and lungs were burning already but I kept running, pounding away, right behind Rahvi. His own rifle was fine, and as we ran he unshouldered it and fired a burst at the glass wall before us. A waterfall of shattered glass came cascading down, and moments later we were crunching across it, inside the terminal.
In the gloom of the dusk I’d seen what I thought was piles of rubbish scattered across the terminal interior. Now, as we entered, I remembered the stories the RAAF crew had told us, about retaking the whole airport. Too many to burn, they’d said; they’d just left them in the terminal.
It wasn’t rubbish. It was corpses. Thousands and thousands of rotting, ravaged corpses. The stench hit us like a wall and I gagged immediately, slowing in my stride, fighting the urge to vomit. Rats and cockroaches streaked away from us as we disturbed them. The whole terminal was a tomb, a charnel house, an open burial ground.
We didn’t have time to be queasy. Rahvi dashed across the floor, jumping over bodies, past overturned velvet ropes and pot plants, beneath black and white display boards for destinations like Auckland or Suva or Kuala Lumpur, all of them with the glaring red word CANCELLED next to them. Quarantine signs, health warning signs; a world that had tried to throw up precautions that were too little, too late. The results were the thousands of dead bodies all around us.
I could see the Globemaster, past the seats and cafes and baggage claim belts, out the glass on the other side – still across a good couple hundred metres of tarmac. But it was there, running lights blinking red in the gathering dusk, propellers already firing up, loading ramp down. It looked like sanctuary. Like the Garden of Eden. And it was so close.
Rahvi and I sprinted across the terminal, vaulting across plastic seats, scattering vermin in our wake. Rahvi opened fire again, a quick burst, shattering the glass ahead of us.
Even as he did, he glanced over his shoulder. He stopped and slowed. Something was wrong - I could hear something, sense something – and I slowed as well and turned with dread to see the Tiger attack chopper coming down behind us. It was just outside the terminal, looking through the shattered glass wall we’d entered by, struts almost scraping the ground, nose cannon powering up…
Rahvi tackled me from the side, throwing both of us to the ground behind a car rental desk. The chopper opened fire, hot lead tearing through the terminal, ripping into corpses that had lain stagnant for months. I hadn’t thought the smell could get any worse but now a terrible, bloated odour filled the air. The Tiger stopped its fire, but we could still hear it there, lurking outside, rotors thundering away. Waiting.
“Stay down,” Rahvi whispered, still practically on top of me. “It won’t stay long, we’re not the target, the truck’s the target…”
“Unless they’ve already got the truck,” I said. There was a corpse lying right alongside us, in a rotting uniform, not much more than a skull grinning back at us. The nametag on his shirt read MATTHEW.
“They haven’t got the truck,” Rahvi grunted.
“How do you know?”
“Because if they have, we’re fucked, and I’d rather not think about it.” He’d shuffled off me, and was holding a piece of broken glass up, trying to make out the chopper’s reflection in the gloom.
The tone in the rotors suddenly changed – it was muffled, or echoed. “It’s gone!” Rahvi said. “Move, move, move!”
We scrambled out from behind the car rental kiosk, leaving my poor dead namesake to his decay, dashing out across the sea of broken glass that now littered the front of the terminal – Rahvi had shot out one big pane, but the Tiger had certainly taken care of the others. A few seconds later we were back out into the cool evening air, the sweeping expanse of twilight tarmac, the Globemaster a thirty-second sprint away.
Off to our right, the Army truck screeched around the edge of the terminal at high speed, making a beeline for the Globemaster, Blake and the others still clinging to the sides. The APC rumbled into view not far behind it, pumping out heavy calibre fire. The Bushmaster was gone, God knows where, maybe Kemeny blew that one up as well. The APC had been hit, two of the back tyres wobbling uselessly around the rims, the steel kicking up sparks against the asphalt, but the vehicle had been designed to take heavier punishment than that and it was still coming on strong.
Fifty metres away. Legs pounding, heart thumping, Rahvi just ahead of me. The Tiger swooped into view again, hovering above the Globemaster.
Forty metres, and one of the Globemaster’s crew by the loading ramp raised a tube to his shoulder. Another shoulder-mounted missile launcher or some kind of anti-tank weapon. A jet of smoke, a shrieking noise, a missile rocketing out past the approaching Army truck. It slammed into the ground just ahead of the APC and ploughed up a bright cloud of fire and debris. A second later the APC emerged, trailing smoke, but still coming.
Thirty metres away, and now I realised the Globemaster had started to move, slowly rolling forward, beginning the long trip down the runway. The crew didn’t want to waste any time. They were planning to bri
ng the Army truck right up into it, up the ramp, while the plane was taxiing.
“Come on, Matt, move it!” Rahvi screamed, sprinting ahead of me. The chopper was still hovering high above us, the Army truck nearly at the plane, the APC close behind it. Everything converging on one spot. “Move your fucking ass, kid, come on, come on!”
By the time we reached the plane it was already moving at maybe twenty kays an hour. The Army truck hit the ramp a few seconds ahead of us, roaring up the loading ramp with sheer momentum, the stink of exhaust fumes, the blur of camouflage patterns, bearing its precious cargo up inside the plane to safety. The noise from the Globemaster, from the truck, from the lurking Tiger – an assault on my eardrums, a thunderstorm of horrible industrial sound and fury. I was still sprinting, nearly there, the tarmac rushing past beneath my feet.
Rahvi hit the ramp first, taking one last leap and landing on all fours. He turned back and reached a hand out for me, and I lunged towards him. Misstep. The ground jerked away from under my feet and I found myself being dragged, jeans and boots skidding along the tarmac, Rahvi’s grip on my wrist the only thing keeping me from tumbling away and being pulverised beneath the wheels of the APC. I could see it now, still rolling after us, the big mean barrel of its gun pointed right at me. I felt almost delirious with adrenaline. Just shoot, you pussies, I thought. Just shoot and end it, I’m fucking exhausted.
It didn’t shoot. We were within the sheltering aura of the nuclear warhead: the no-fire zone, the demilitarised zone. The whole plane was, now. In the bright lights of the Globemaster’s cargo bay, some of the RAAF crew were coming down the loading ramp, attached to safety wires, grabbing Rahvi and grabbing me. They dragged us up into the plane as the loading ramp slowly raised itself with a reassuring groan of metal, cutting the APC from view, erasing it from our lives. Nice try, assholes, I thought.
The RAAF crewmen helped the two of us up into the cargo bay, bloodied and panting and exhausted, to join the others. “Jesus Christ,” Rickenbacker said, wide-eyed, clapping me on the shoulder. “I thought you guys were dead!”
End Times (Book 4): Destroyer of Worlds Page 24