by Dirk Patton
Yanking it out of my way I ran inside, clicking on the small flashlight. “Martinez, get those doors open!” I shouted as I moved deeper into the hangar. I was talking about the huge rolling doors, and I wanted them open to get what moonlight there was inside to help me find what I was looking for.
At the back of the hangar a large area had been fenced off with chain link that extended all the way to the ceiling. The weak light from the flashlight reflected off of rows of cabinets, stacks of wooden crates at the far end. A heavy chain and padlock secured a wide gate and I raised the rifle but didn’t fire. The padlock was too heavy to be broken by a bullet.
Martinez had gotten the doors open with Katie’s help and run over to stand next to me as I surveyed the supplies.
“What are you looking for?” She asked.
“I need in there,” I said, dashing to a workbench in search of something I could use to cut through the fencing.
Martinez ran the other way and a moment later I heard a loud motor start up. Looking, I blinked when headlights came on and she rolled over behind the wheel of a tractor that was used to move aircraft in and out of the hangar.
“Grab that chain and wrap it around the padlock,” she shouted, pointing at the far end of the workbench. “Then secure it to the hitch.”
While I worked, she spun the tractor around and backed up to the fence. Chain looped through the one holding the gate, I hooked it onto the tractor and stepped back, making sure Dog and Katie were clear.
“Go!” I shouted.
Martinez hit the throttle, the fat tires spinning on the smooth concrete for a moment before gaining traction. The tractor shot forward, the chain jingling noisily as it paid out, then it went tight and the whole gate was ripped out of the fence. Martinez drove another thirty feet, dragging the big section of fence across the hangar, then came to a stop. Hopping off she unhooked, then climbed back on and spun the vehicle around to shine its lights into the caged area.
“Now, what do you need?” She asked, running over to join me. Katie was right behind her and I was glad to see Dog was next to her.
57
The mortars had run dry, the crews firing them grabbing their personal weapons and running to join the defenders that were behind the double ring of Claymores. Several thousand civilians were now armed with M4 rifles, sprinkled in amongst the Rangers and Marines. There were a handful of World War II and Korean War vets, many unable to walk without a cane or walker but still able to hold a rifle, that had declared their intention to fight to the last.
There were also women and children as young as ten holding rifles in their small hands. Everyone was frightened; several of the civilians expressing surprise when they realized the fighting men around them were scared too.
“Only fools and psychopaths aren’t scared before a battle,” Crawford heard a Marine Sergeant saying to a woman so terrified she was almost hyperventilating. “It’s how you handle the fear that matters.”
He would have liked to hear more of the conversation, but kept moving as he walked the lines. Pointere was doing the same thing, working the opposite side of the flight line. They were encouraging where needed, adjusting and directing people to plug gaps in the final layer of defense between the infected and the flight line.
The return flight of planes was half an hour away. They had to hold long enough for them to get on the ground, refuel, load and escape. Ninety minutes minimum. He didn’t think it could be done, but kept his doubts to himself, constantly praising the defenders and telling them they would succeed.
Infected were flowing over the moat. Not in large numbers, yet, but the trickle that would become a torrent had begun. Everyone had been pulled back and the crew manning the firing panel for the Claymore mines was ready. All they needed was the order from Pointere.
Taking up position behind a machine gun emplacement, Crawford climbed to the top of a tall pile of sandbags to have a better view. Overhead, Osprey’s hovered, keeping a constant eye on the entire perimeter and providing Pointere and Crawford with a steady stream of reports. Crawford had chosen the spot where he’d stopped because it was reported as the heaviest concentration of infected.
As the females continued to climb over the top of the blast wall, drop to the ground and sprint forward, specified Rangers and Marines began picking them off with single shots. They weren’t going for head or heart shots, but targeting hips and legs. This gave them bigger targets and even though the females weren’t being killed, they were going down and could only drag themselves forward.
Once they were on the ground and moving slowly, they were easier targets and were finished off by the civilians. This was working, but the front was steadily pressing closer to the defenders. As the volume of infected continued to grow there weren’t enough rifles to target all of them quickly enough to prevent their advance.
Females that had held back when the moat was burning were now sacrificing themselves. Crawford didn’t try to figure out the reasoning behind it, just noted it and filed it away. He remained stoic, standing on his elevated vantage point, watching through binoculars as the infected surged. The trickle had become a torrent in only a few minutes.
“Target only the front runners!” He shouted into the radio.
“Claymores, stand by,” Pointere transmitted a moment later.
A solid mass of females was now running towards the defenders. The volume of rifle fire had increased and he could see the fastest females, those who had pulled out in front, go down in a tumble of limbs as their hips or legs were shattered by a well placed bullet.
“One hundred yards. Claymores ready,” Pointere called.
The infected kept charging. With surprise, Crawford realized there were so many of them that he could feel the ground shaking all the way up through the sandbags he was standing on. Glancing around at the defenders lying on the dirt he saw them look at each other in fear when they felt the same thing.
The screams of the charging females were deafening. Tens of thousands of throats, all crying for blood. Their blood.
“Claymore outer ring only, fire on my command. Repeat. Outer ring ONLY! On my command,” Pointere called on the radio, sounding calm even though he was shouting to be heard.
The infected kept running. Kept screaming. Crawford could see the blood red eyes in his binoculars, as they focused on their prey.
“Claymores FIRE!” Pointere ordered.
A Claymore mine is a simple device, nothing more than a convex shaped plastic container holding a layer of C4 explosive set behind 700 steel ball bearings. The convex design creates a sixty-degree wide pattern into which the ball bearings are propelled at 4,000 feet per second. Within the first fifty yards, nothing made of flesh and bone will survive. Out to one hundred yards, there’s maybe a ten percent chance of survival.
Every man and woman felt the concussion of thousands of mines. Teeth were rattled and bones were vibrated. Around the entire perimeter, the outer ring detonated in a ripple, the electrical charge reaching the detonators at different times depending on the length of the wire connected to the master panel.
Hundreds of thousands of steel balls screamed outwards from where they had been embedded in an epoxy resin, each of them instantly breaking the sound barrier, which added to the volume of noise. Tens of thousands of female infected were shredded. Flesh was stripped from bone. Bones were broken and skulls crushed. Limbs were severed from bodies.
After the ear shattering blast, everything fell silent. There’s a silence that descends over battlefields after the deployment of massively destructive weapons by desperate troops. The fighters on the side that launched the attack are holding their breath, waiting to see if they’re going to survive another minute. The side that was just attacked pauses, partly in shock and partly in fear, waiting to see how badly they were hurt.
It’s an eerie silence. Surreal after a long siege where there’s been the constant sounds of battle for what feels like a lifetime. Many of the entrenched defenders had e
xperienced it before. Some on beaches in Normandy or valleys in France and Germany. Others on the Korean Peninsula, or in the jungles of Vietnam and Central America, or the deserts and mountains of the Middle East.
Crawford hadn’t been sure what to expect when the mines were detonated. He wouldn’t have been surprised if the infected had just kept coming as if nothing had happened. He’d had a conversation with the Major about the defense that had bought time for evacuees in Murfreesboro, and how nothing could deter the advance of the enemy. Having witnessed it himself on smaller scales, he hadn’t held out hope that the Claymores would do anything more than buy a couple of extra minutes.
So when silence descended over the area, and dust thrown into the air by the blasts began to clear, he was shocked to see a solid wall of females standing and staring. Their advance had stopped at the point where the devastation of the mines had reached, nearly eighty yards from where the Claymores had been placed.
“What the hell?” He muttered to himself, shaking his head and raising the binoculars to scan the perimeter.
In every direction the females had halted. This wouldn’t have surprised him if they had been a normal enemy who felt fear, but he was shocked. He’d seen the females holding back at the moat, waiting for the fires to burn out, but not for a moment had he thought they could be brought to a halt like this.
“Any movement on your side?” Pointere’s voice in his earpiece startled him, making him jump.
“No. They’re holding for the moment,” he answered.
Crawford listened as Pointere made calls to different junior officers spread around the perimeter. The news was all the same. The females had stopped and were just staring at the defenders.
“Sir, the front ranks are static around the entire perimeter, but there’s lots of movement in the rear.” This report came in from one of the Ospreys hovering over the battle.
“What kind of movement?” Pointere asked.
“Can’t tell for sure sir. Stand by.” One of the Ospreys changed position and descended to hover a hundred feet over a section of the infected. It slowly began drifting along the front as the pilots tried to see what was happening.
“Males, sir.” The answer finally came after several minutes. “They are pushing males forward through their ranks.”
“Goddamn it!” Crawford raged when he realized what the females were doing.
“What?” Pointere asked as he ran up to where he stood.
“Meat for the grinder,” Crawford growled. “Just like they did with the moat, they’re going to let the males come forward and absorb the worst of the damage and deplete our defenses. Enough males and we’ll have to use the second layer of mines, then the females can charge in.”
“They’re that fucking smart?” Pointere asked, surprise clear on his face.
“Apparently,” Crawford said. “Smart enough to fuck us.”
58
The old helicopter vibrated hard as Martinez pulled back on the stick and lifted us into the air. The long, heavy rotors made the thumping sound unique to Hueys. The sound that for some reason always made me feel good. Maybe, just like the old fire house dog that jumped up every time he heard the bell, that rotor noise was such a part of my younger days that I got a little surge of adrenaline just from hearing it.
We had spent several minutes raiding the secure lockers in the hangar, finding most of what I wanted. Setting it aside, I’d left the heavy lifting for Martinez and Katie while I tackled the aircraft’s side doors. It took some effort and some language my mother wouldn’t have approved of, but with the help of tools from the hangar I had gotten them off their tracks, letting them crash down onto the tarmac. Next, I spent a couple of minutes removing the frames for the web sling seats in the back to make as much room as possible inside.
“What are you doing?” Katie asked, trotting up. She was carrying one end of a long, heavy wooden crate, Martinez following with the other end.
“Getting us ready,” I said, grabbing the crate from them and hoisting it into the aircraft.
Prying the lid off, I had quickly installed a pintle in the mounting point on the side of the Huey’s deck. Next came the vintage M60 machine gun, which attached easily to the pintle. I kept working as they brought out more of the gear I’d selected. Full cans of ammo were strapped down to the deck and I strung up the safety harness that would keep the door gunner from being tossed out when the deck tilted or the helicopter made a sharp turn.
More gear was brought out and secured as I took a moment to fashion a harness for dog out of the web sling seating I had previously removed. The deck of a Huey is slick, and with the side doors gone there wasn’t much of anything to keep man or beast from being tossed out in mid-air. Makeshift harness firmly wrapped around his body, I called Dog in and connected a short lead from his back to a swivel hook set into the ceiling.
Finally ready, I strapped myself in behind the M60 as Martinez and Katie climbed into the cockpit. The engine fired up and the rotor was gaining speed as I pulled the charging handle on the machine gun. Then I had nothing to do except be a passenger as Martinez lifted off.
“This thing’s a pig,” she said after we had gained a few hundred feet of altitude and were pounding our way to the southwest towards Tinker.
“How about a little respect, Captain.” I said. “Older and slower doesn’t mean there’s not still some sharp teeth left.”
“Are you talking about yourself or the helicopter, honey?” Katie quipped, Martinez bursting out laughing.
Sighing, I wrapped my arm around Dog’s neck and pressed my face against the side of his head. Maybe he had the right idea when he was staying away from those two.
Martinez gained altitude as we flew until even with the moonlight the ground below was only dark and featureless. Getting used to how the old girl handled, she made some maneuvers, swaying us back and forth. She put us into a dive, pulling out and powering back to altitude as she turned sharply. She might have a smart mouth, but the woman’s skills with the stick were second only to her capabilities with a knife.
“You about done?” I asked after ten long minutes of aerial acrobatics.
“Sorry, sir. Just getting a feel for the lady.” She sounded anything but sorry. “Maybe I was a little too hasty. She’s not so bad.”
I didn’t take the bait, knowing there was no way I could hold my own with the two of them. Looking around I checked on Dog, very glad I’d been able to securely tether him. He was standing in the middle of the deck, all four legs splayed out to help keep his balance. His head was down, ears flat against his skull and he looked miserable. I rubbed his neck, turning back when Martinez spoke on the intercom.
“Sir, I’ve got a Navy flight on the radio. They’re inbound to Tinker. You want to talk to them?” She asked.
Navy? What the hell? “Yes. Can you put them over the intercom?”
“Can do. Stand by.” She said. “Go ahead sir.”
“Navy flight, US Army helo.” I said.
“Panther flight copies. We’ve got you inbound to Tinker on radar. We’re coming to join the party.”
“Damn good to hear that, Navy.” I said. “Hope you brought some party favors. This is a BYOB event.”
“Copy that, Army.” He chuckled. “We’re a flight of twelve Hornets off the Big Ronnie. We’ve got the life of the party tagging along, low and slow. We stopped off at Hurlburt in Florida and picked up Spooky. We’re monitoring the comms out of Tinker. Sounds like one hell of a fight going on, but we can’t raise a controller to direct fire.” The Big Ronnie would be the USS Ronald Reagan, a newer generation supercarrier. Most likely in the Gulf of Mexico or off the southeastern coast for them to be able to stop in Florida, then reach Oklahoma City.
God bless the US Navy! When I heard “Spooky” I wanted to cheer. Spooky is an AC-130U gunship. An Air Force C-130 converted specifically for ground troop support. Heavily armored, it flies a low and slow orbit over a battlefield. Outfitted with a 25 mm GAU-12 Equalize
r, one Bofors 40 mm autocannon, and one 105 mm M102 cannon, it can and does unleash hell on earth.
“You Navy guys sure know how to party,” I said. “What’s your ETA to target?”
“Twenty mikes for Panther flight. Thirty, three-zero, for Spooky.” He answered.
“What’s our ETA, Martinez?” I asked over the intercom without transmitting on the radio.
“Fifteen minutes,” she said.
“Panther flight, I’ll be your controller. Designation…” I looked around, trying to think of a call sign. Seeing Dog looking miserable I smiled and turned back to face out the open side of the Huey. “Dog four.”
“Copy Dog Four. Will contact on this frequency when we’re on station.”
“Dog Four copies,” I transmitted, then switched to intercom. “Martinez, give her all she’s got. And turn up the overhead. I can’t hear what’s going on at Tinker.”
A moment later the vibration increased as she pushed the old Huey to its maximum speed. Soon after that the speaker over my head blared as she increased the volume.
“Claymores FIRE!” I heard.
59
As Crawford and Pointere watched, males kept pushing through the front ranks of the females to make their stumbling way across the field of bodies that had been shattered by the Claymores. Many of them tripped in their blind shamble, but many more managed to stay on their feet. They weren’t moving fast, but they were advancing, their numbers growing.
Faster than it seemed possible, the open space between the final layer of mines and the females filled. The males packed together, the ones in front slowed by the footing, but as more and more of them trudged along their feet smoothed the way for the ones following. Soon, a solid wall of flesh was only twenty yards from the ring, the snarls and hisses reaching the defenders.
“Claymores stand by.” Pointere transmitted over the radio.
Crawford checked his rifle, knowing that as soon as the last of the mines detonated, there would be a rush forward by the females. He glanced over his shoulder as a Globemaster thumped onto the runway, the ground shaking from the roar as the pilot used thrust reversers to slow the massive plane. At least they’d get some more people out before the defenses completely collapsed.