by Dirk Patton
Indestructible
V Plague Book 7
DIRK PATTON
Text Copyright © 2015 by Dirk Patton
Copyright © 2015 by Dirk Patton
All Rights Reserved
This book, or any portion thereof, may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the copyright holder or publisher, except for the use of brief quotations in a critical book review.
Published by Voodoo Dog Publishing, LLC
2824 N Power Road
Suite #113-256
Mesa, AZ 85215
Printed in the United States of America
First Printing, 2015
ISBN-13: 978-1508565079
ISBN-10: 1508565074
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, brands, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Table of Contents
Author’s Note
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
ALSO BY DIRK PATTON
Afterword
Author’s Note
Thank you for purchasing Indestructible, Book 7 in the V Plague series. If you haven’t read the first six books you need to stop reading now and pick them up, otherwise you will be lost as this book is intended to continue the story in a serialized format. I intentionally did nothing to explain comments and events that reference book 1 through 6. Regardless, you have my heartfelt thanks for reading my work and I hope you’re enjoying the adventure as much as I am. As always, a good review on Amazon is greatly appreciated and the best way to ensure more books are published.
Determination that is incorruptible
From the other side, a terror to behold
Annihilation will be unavoidable
Every broken enemy will know
That their opponent had to be invincible
Take a last look around while you're alive
I'm an indestructible
Master of war
Indestructible – Disturbed
1
Pain. Pain and darkness. And pressure. I didn’t know where the hell I was or how I’d gotten there. Or what was on top of me. Crushing me. It was hard to breathe. Impossible to take more than a very shallow breath of stale air.
And the smell. The raw stink of urine and feces. The coppery odor of blood. But whose blood? For that matter, whose bladder and bowels? Then it came flooding back in a rush of vivid, brightly colored memories, almost like watching a movie where the director is trying too hard to be artistic and as a result fails to tell a cohesive story.
The fight in the casino. Finally finding Katie. Both her and Martinez on the floor, bleeding. Killing Roach. Piling into an Osprey that was taking us to Tinker where the two women could get proper medical attention for their wounds. The aircraft’s engines shutting down. Cradling Katie in my arms as we quickly lost altitude. Meeting Rachel’s eyes and seeing her acceptance of our fate a moment before we struck the ground.
That’s where the movie ended. No closing credits. No little flashes of action to help wrap up the story. Just a memory of an incredible impact accompanied with the horrible sounds of the Osprey disintegrating on impact, then nothing. OK, more like a poorly ended movie or TV series that leaves the fate of some poor bastard to whatever the audience imagines by just cutting to black.
I’m not sure how long I lay there, conscious, but feeling like I was in a bad daydream. I might have lain there until thirst or hunger spurred me to action, however long that would have taken, but I remembered that Katie had been shot and needed my help. That snapped me fully alert and I tried to move my legs, banging against something with my boot.
A hard tug on my foot. Then a second tug, harder than the first, and the snarl of an infected. That got me going as about a gallon of adrenaline dumped into my bloodstream. I should have already been analyzing my situation, trying to figure out what was lying on top of me and how I’d extricate myself, but instead I’d been too caught up with worrying about how I got there in the first place.
I was on my left side, something that I was reasonably sure was my rifle trapped between the hard deck and me. A large piece of the Osprey was on top of me, crushing me. Trying to turn my body to get my hands up and push, I grunted when the infected pulled and twisted on my foot hard enough to send a jolt of pain all the way into my hip.
Pushing down rising panic, I managed to wrench my upper body around, turning at the waist. My hips and upper legs were pinned tightly and I couldn’t move them at all. Shoulders flat to the floor I placed my palms on the piece of debris and pushed. Nothing moved, other than the infected’s hand working its way to the top of my boot.
Whatever was on top of me was large and smooth. I suspected it was part of the Osprey’s fuselage, and if it was a large enough chunk, I was screwed. Just because the damn things can fly, there’s really no part of an aircraft that is light when it’s lying on top of you. Taking a deep breath I grunted and pushed with everything I had.
Nothing. With a curse I blew out the breath I had held while pushing and grimaced as I felt a hand clamp down on my leg just above the top edge of my boot. I needed to do something before the infected managed to squirm his way any farther up. Twisting my head around, I was able to see down the length of my body.
It was hard to tell, but looked like my feet were sticking out into open space. The sun was shining brightly and I could clearly see the male that was trying to make a mid-day snack out of me. He was dressed in a uniform and it took me a minute to remember that while we were in the casino the Osprey had extracted a small Army unit that was surrounded by infected. They must have been out in the field and never received the vaccine that was distributed at Tinker Air Force Base.
My fear for Katie and the rest of my friends ratcheted up and I tried to kick as he resumed his attack, but my legs were pinned too tightly and all I succeeded in doing was to bump the side of his head with my boot. He turned and bit down on the thick leather, fortunately unable to tear through to my flesh.
My arms had a fair degree of freedom and I reached for the object that had been digging into my side when I’d first awakened. As I suspected, it was the Sig Sauer rifle, still held securely to my body by its sling. I began working it around, trying to get it into a position that would let me shoot.
It was slow going. The sling hampered my ability to bring the weapon to bear, an
d while I was working on it the male had shifted his efforts at a snack to my boot’s upper. Fear rising, I fumbled for the quick release button on the sling, desperate to kill the damn thing before he moved up to where there was only fabric to protect me from his teeth.
Fingers finally finding the button, I pressed it and ripped the rifle free of the sling. Twisting, I ignored the pain in my back and hips as I forced my body into a position it wasn’t intended to achieve. Maybe I should have accepted Katie’s offers to attend Yoga classes with her.
The rifle came onto target, but I was forced to hold it with one hand and guess whether or not the muzzle was aimed at the infected. My arm was bent at ninety degrees and I couldn’t use the scope. If I was off, even a little, I would blast a hole through my foot.
With a deep breath I lined up as best I could and pulled the trigger. And missed both the male and my foot. The rifle was very quiet when it fired, but it was still loud enough to draw the attention of my attacker. He stopped biting on my boot and swiveled his head towards the source of the sound.
By now my arm was growing tired from maintaining such an awkward pose and I couldn’t hold the weapon steady. The infected hissed at me and dragged himself higher until his head came up against the debris that was pinning me down. Turning my ankle as far away from him as I could, hoping to keep my foot out of the line of fire, I pulled the trigger again.
The bullet took off most of the male’s ear, powder burns stippling the skin of his face. How the hell did I miss? It was a four foot shot at the most! Silencing my frantically racing mind, I struggled to get the weapon pointed where I wanted it, sweat pouring off of me as I forced my body to still itself.
Pulling the trigger again, I exhaled and let my arm flop to the deck when a neat hole appeared in the infected’s forehead. I only rested for a moment before looking back up to take a better survey of my situation. My head pounded, my lower back and hips were on fire and I was sick to my stomach. Blood from head wounds was pouring down my forehead and blocking most of the vision from my right eye. But none of that would matter if I kept lying here until more infected showed up.
Forcing myself to not get distracted by worry over Katie or Rachel or any of the others, I reached down and ran my hands over my body where I was pinned. The same piece of metal that was over my chest and head also pressed tightly on my hips and thighs. Feeling around, I stopped when my fingers banged up against my holstered pistol.
The pistol was in a thigh holster, and the whole rig had been pushed up my leg during the crash. Whatever the piece of debris was, it was resting directly onto the holster, wedging my body in place. This was the first good news. Yes, I was pinned tightly, but if I could remove the pistol and holster I’d gain enough space to wriggle my hips around and start working to get out of the trap. Of course that assumed that as soon as I got the pistol off, the debris didn’t shift farther down and pin me again.
It took some doing, but I succeeded in getting a hand far enough down my body to touch the upper buckle that held the holster rig. Several minutes later I suppressed a victory shout when it clicked open. Reminding myself ‘that was the easy one’, I rested for a moment, using my collar to wipe sweat and blood out of my eyes.
Heart rate almost back to normal, I reached for the second buckle, farther down my leg. I couldn’t touch it. No matter how I stretched or twisted or contorted my body, I just couldn’t get my hand in place to release the buckle. This time I had to suppress a scream of frustration.
2
I don’t know how much time passed. I wanted to shout for Katie or Rachel or Martinez or Zemeck or anyone. But concern over alerting more infected to my presence kept me quiet. I struggled with the metal that had me trapped, but it was immovable, at least from the position I was in. I must have tried to reach the second holster buckle a hundred times, but I don’t think I ever came close.
The blood had crusted on my head and face, and I could feel several small cuts and one large gash on my skull. The smaller ones had clotted and stopped bleeding, but the multi-inch laceration that started on the top of my head and continued down through my right eyebrow was open and raw, still weeping. I made the mistake of touching it once, the pain enough to prevent me from trying it a second time.
The blow that had caused the wound had also given me another concussion. It had only been a couple of days since I was knocked goofy when a bullet fired through the head of an infected by Irina had grazed my temple. While I had been feeling normal, I’ve had enough concussions in my day to know they don’t completely heal that quickly, and it’s not good to get another one while still recovering from the first.
A headache and nausea were the most telling symptoms of the damage. I suspected I’d also have double vision if I were ever able to get out and see anything in the daylight. Not worrying about something I was unable to do anything about at the moment, I looked over my situation again. Nothing was different or new since the last time, or the several dozen times before that. I was stuck and it wasn’t looking like I’d be able to get myself free.
Then, I wasn’t sure I wanted to get free. Free to do what? Find Katie dead? Rachel and Dog, too, as well as the rest of my group? They had to be dead. They wouldn’t have left me behind. What the hell did it matter if I got free if everyone in the world I cared about was dead? Get free to spend the rest of my days fighting the infected? To what end?
Maybe I was better off to just stay right here and relax. Lack of water would finish me off in two or three days at the most. With a sigh of resignation I laid my head back and closed my eyes. Dying of dehydration wouldn’t be pleasant. Maybe I’d just stick the muzzle of the rifle in my mouth and end it all before the pain and thirst got too bad. “That’s what I’ll do”, I thought to myself a moment before I lost consciousness.
I don’t know how long I was out, but it was dark when I woke. Not that I could tell the difference in my little metal cave, but if I craned my head around just right I could see past my feet and into the open. Terrain that had been clearly visible in bright sunshine earlier was now hidden by the night. Dark night that hid predators.
Not wolves or mountain lions, or anything like that. It was the two legged variety that was so dangerous, especially the females. And they were quiet. Maybe it was because the virus had enhanced their senses, and with improved hearing came more awareness of the sounds they made. Perhaps this helped them to adjust and be stealthy. Maybe not. Either way, I didn’t hear the female approaching until she was within a few feet of me.
The first indication she was there was when I heard her sniffing the air. Cautiously, I twisted around and could just faintly make out a pair of feet standing close to mine. Afraid if I moved again it would make a noise and alert her to my presence, I stayed in the uncomfortable position and barely breathed. I might be ready to put a gun in my mouth, but I sure as hell wasn’t ready to be torn apart and eaten by an infected.
She stood there for a long time, frequently sniffing. Did she smell me? Maybe she did, but there were apparently enough smells of death in the crashed aircraft to confuse her. Finally, my screaming muscles and ligaments couldn’t remain contorted any longer and I slowly straightened my back and neck. Not that I was able to move into a comfortable position, but it was better than a constant fire in every fiber between my head and waist.
I didn’t think I made a sound as I slowly moved my upper body, but something caught the infected’s attention. She inhaled sharply and held her breath, waiting for whatever she’d detected to repeat. I was frozen in place, hand gripping the rifle tightly even though I had serious doubts about being able to use it effectively if she attacked.
There was a thump, then even more pressure on my pinned body. She had climbed onto the debris that trapped me. The sniffing started again, her new location causing the sound to echo off the hard surfaces inside the downed Osprey. That sound sent chills up and down my spine.
She moved again, a footstep sounding right over my head. Pausing, she sniffed t
hen stopped and held her breath. Had she found me? Did she know I was right under her feet and all she had to do was raise the debris to find a hidden prize? I thought about revealing myself and hoping the infected would be able to lift the metal off of me.
They’re strong as hell. Pound for pound, at least twice as strong as an uninfected human. Maybe she could lift the weight, but as I thought about it I dismissed the idea. All it would take would be for her to search around the edges until she found my feet sticking out, then she could attack. Sure, I’d been able to kill the male, but he was moving slow, and in reality I had shot a stationary target. It wouldn’t be nearly as easy with a fast and agile female.
I stayed absolutely still and silent. Breathed shallowly through my mouth and willed her to grow bored and move on. That was unlikely, as I’ve seen the infected demonstrate an amazing degree of patience when they believe there is prey to be had. That was the question. Was she sure enough something was here that she would wait it out, or was I hidden well enough?
Time stretched out, and more than twenty minutes must have passed before she finally moved again. Unfortunately not back out, but a few steps in the direction I’d come to think of as farther into the aircraft. She took two steps on the metal object covering me, then stepped off and slipped as lose debris shifted under her weight.
Numerous metallic objects fell to the deck, making a hell of a racket. Something that I couldn’t identify in the dark struck me in the face, opening another small cut, and remained pressing tightly against me. I could tell it was a smooth metal rod of some sort, but nothing else.
When the debris shifted the female must have leapt backwards to stable footing because there was a thump I could feel in my legs and the object pinning me down shifted slightly. My heart leapt and I was hardly able to contain my excitement. It shifted! If it shifted, it could be moved! Had she dislodged something that was holding it in place? Didn’t know and didn’t care. Just wanted her to get the hell out of there so I could try to get free again. I’d decided I wanted to live after all.