by James, Glynn
“No!” Fick shouted aloud. Jesus Christ – they should have barricaded the door, they should have destroyed the first-floor stairwell… But there had been no time, and no manpower to do it. And anyway the tower had been part of the position they were holding – until it wasn’t, when the eastern line collapsed, the dead enveloping the position. It had all happened so goddamned quickly… In the stark crisis of the machine-gun assault, and the general assault, Fick had lost track of one of his men – and the one most vulnerable. Sure, he had ordered Chesney to come down. But he’d disobeyed the order, and there’d been no time to hound or chase him.
Now he hailed the Kid on the radio, and got him – but immediately got put on hold: “Wait one!” Chesney said, sounding out of breath. Across the open channel, Fick could hear both moaning and firing. Chesney must be engaged to his six now, dead swarming up and in his rear.
Fuck fuck fuck.
The plane picked up speed rapidly, bouncing violently down the tarmac.
Freezing for one second, Fick pictured Chesney’s ridiculously youthful face. He remembered how damned young the LT had been – only about the same age the Kid was now. And he decided. He determined that he was not going to send another young man to die in his place, covering the team’s withdrawal. Leaving Graybeard was almost too painful to bear. But at least he’d had his time on this hellish, fallen Earth. The Kid was… well, he was just a goddamned kid. And it wasn’t right. Fick couldn’t swallow it.
He just couldn’t lose both of them.
He turned and pushed his way past the sprawl and tangle of people and equipment toward the front.
Standing over the belly hatch, his big arms crossed, was Brady – wounded, but back on his feet and still damned imposing. He said, “All due respect, but sit your ass the fuck down, Master Gunnery Sergeant.” Fick eyed him up. He’d evidently mainly been shot in his Kevlar vest, though he was also bleeding from one arm. He did not by any means look combat ineffective.
Fick leaned in and shoved him hard with both hands in the chest. Brady fell back, but instantly slipped away, came around behind Fick, and put him in a rear chokehold. “Don’t be an asshole, Gunny. The tower’s overrun. There’s no way you can get to him. We gotta go. And this team can’t do without you.” On some level Fick knew Brady was right – that he didn’t have the right to throw his life away. Not just so he could exorcise some goddamned demon from his past.
But he couldn’t stop himself.
He reached up and pulled the release on his helmet chinstrap, which effectively shrunk his head, and allowed him to slip out of Brady’s chokehold. He then kneed the big man in the groin, and as he reached for the hatch handle, the accelerating bomber ramped over a pile of dead Zulus, launching Fick toward the ceiling. Without his helmet on, his jar-shaped head slammed into a steel strut.
His already-dark world went black.
And he collapsed to the deck.
Greater Love
Beaver Island
On the vibrating deck of the hurtling bomber, Fick came foggily awake to the sound of a voice in his head: “…You’re taking off, aren’t you?”
At first he thought he was dreaming. But then he recognized the voice as Graybeard’s. And the source of it was his radio earpiece.
He struggled to lever his eyelids up above half-mast. He could feel the bomber shaking violently all around him, as it accelerated down the runway toward take-off. His bell had really been rung, though, and his guard was down. He keyed his mic and said, simply, “Affirmative. We’re taking off.”
There was a brief pause on the other end. “It’s okay, Gunny. I know you’ve got to go. I’ll see you on the other side, brother. Semper fidelis, semper ferte.”
Before Fick could even think how to respond to this, shouts rose up all around him as the antique heavy bomber, which had been blasting down the runway nearly at take-off speed, now decelerated violently, brakes and tires shrieking, engines powering down and reversing.
Fick hauled himself up to his hands and knees – and then, with a superhuman effort, to his feet. His head pounded, and now that the adrenaline had stopped pumping for a few seconds, the burns on his upper body screamed red hot. He lurched into the cockpit and dropped himself in the co-pilot’s seat. Beside him the pilot was wrestling with the shuddering aircraft, as the end of the runway raced at them through the glass.
“What?” Fick said. “What the fuck now?”
While simultaneously trying to keep them from crashing off the end of the tarmac, the pilot gestured out the right window. “Look for yourself!” Fick could see that the far engine on the right wing was shut down, its propeller still spinning in some crazy-ass, off-kilter way. As it spun down, Fick could see that it had been shot up, with multiple holes and bent and torn edges. Evidently the Zulu machine gunner had gotten in one last jab.
“We’re too heavy!” the pilot yelped. “I can’t get us off the ground! Not with three fucking engines…!” Though they had already slowed radically, the end of the tarmac was nearly upon them, and the pilot twisted the yoke, turning the plane at the last instant, onto the second, shorter runway that met the main one at an angle. The enormous machine tilted and lurched, but made the turn and stayed on all three wheels.
Fick scanned in all directions out the glass. Mainly, what he could see was the dead running at them from everywhere – reorienting on the plane’s new position. They hadn’t gotten off the ground. But they had at least gotten the undead swarm off them, if only for a minute or two.
Fick pulled himself to his feet. “We’ll lighten up,” he said, gritting his teeth. “We’ll ditch more weight. Can we take off on this runway?”
“Negative! This one’s thirty percent shorter, it’s a no go. But I can loop us back around, taxi to where we started, and try again.”
“Make it happen,” Fick said, wading back into the cabin and shouting. “Listen up! It’s a fire sale – everything goes! Ammo, personal rucks, water. Irreplaceable weapons, I don’t give a shit.” He reached the middle of the plane, reversed his rifle, and smashed out the glass of the machine-gun bubble. He then unclipped the XM-29 and hurled it out the hole.
“Great,” Predator muttered, shrugging out of his ruck. “So much for cabin pressure.”
Ali, pulling off hers as well, answered: “You’re as dumb as you are big. These old things don’t pressurize.”
“Oh,” Pred said, shoving his ruck out the window, and then reaching for one of a pile of puffy backpacks on the floor.
“Not those,” said Brady, from where he lay on the deck. “Those are our parachutes.”
“Ah. My bad.”
Fick found his M16 lying where he’d left it, took it over to the belly hatch, opened that up, and started firing out of it. They had the additional problem now of keeping the dead from clumping up either on them or on the main runway, so they could try taking off again. But it was at least complementary with their other problem – that of shucking weight. Fick was getting ammo off the plane and putting it someplace useful – into the enemy.
He vocally urged the others to do the same.
“Get rid of all ammo!” he bellowed. “Shoot it or shove it, I don’t give a shit!”
The sound of the other blister window breaking sounded over the firing of his M16. Other weapons joined the chorus. And the .50 in the tail started up good and heavy again. The bomber started taxiing briskly up the shorter runway, heading for the point where it joined a taxiway that led back to the control tower again, and the eastern end of the main runway – right where they’d started. Describing a loop did have the advantage of leading the dead in a merry chase, most of it off the main runway.
As Fick held his rifle low and out the hatch, blasting away, he briefly let his hopes get up that there might now be another chance to rescue Chesney. But when the control tower came into view, he could see dead bodies still pouring into it. It was totally overrun. More damningly, Fick knew he couldn’t stop the plane, or it would be swarmed and never get going again. He co
uld just jump off on his own – but deep down he knew that would only mean he and the Kid would both be left behind. Still, he was damned tempted.
But when he hailed him again… this time he got no response at all.
* * *
As they made the second turn, onto the taxiway, Fick got an unexpected radio call from their Tailgunner Charlie – Reyes.
“Yo, Gunny!”
Fick paused firing to answer – but, while he talked, he tossed grenades out the hatch. “Go.”
“We’re being followed, Jefe.”
“No shit. Light ’em the fuck up.”
The whole cabin of the plane was now a riot of people shooting, hurling grenades, and throwing shit out onto the tarmac. There weren’t nearly enough holes in the plane to support this – just the hatch and the two broken blister windows. Burly-ass operators were elbowing one another aside to get at them.
“I think maybe I shouldn’t shoot this one,” Reyes said. “He’s driving a Land Rover…”
Fick mouthed Fuck me, dropped his M16 straight out the hatch, turned on his heel and ran the length of the plane. As he did, he tripped on something, which squealed. It was the random girl, trying to cower out of the way. WTF? As Fick recovered his balance and resumed hurtling, a familiar voice came through his earpiece.
“You guys got room for one more?”
“Graybeard! You old-ass son of a bitch!”
With that, Fick reached the tail turret, stuck his head in, and looked out to their rear. Sure enough, there was the Land Rover, ten meters behind and a few to the side, keeping pace with the hurtling bomber. The aborted take-off had given him enough time to make it back, though the plane was now taxiing fast as hell, buzzing and bouncing. Fick could see Graybeard shooting his SCAR one-handed out the passenger window and steering with the other.
He looked down at Reyes, who was putting long, careful, rolling 50-cal bursts into the legions of runners who were doing a pretty decent job of keeping up with the plane themselves. As the guns roared, bodies fell to pieces and scattered to the tarmac in splashes of black gunk, still rolling along with their momentum. Graybeard dodged the bigger chunks, weaving in and out, while shooting non-stop.
Fick hailed the pilot: “Stop the fucking plane!”
“Negative! We stop moving, they’ll be all over us. We’ll never get moving again.”
Fick cursed. Obviously he already knew that. But that was one of his men, right there behind them…
Reyes shouted over the roar. “So go reel his ass in, Gunny!”
Fick realized Reyes was totally fucking crazy – and totally right.
But then he pictured the layout of the plane – the belly hatch was just in front of the goddamned engines and propellers. There was no way to drive the truck up to it.
But when he turned, he saw that Ali and Henno had just pulled open a hatch he hadn’t even known was there, and were now chucking shit out of it. This was only a few feet up from the tail, on the right side – the small rear escape hatch. Fick bodily shoved the two Alpha people to the side, stuck his head out, and looked behind them. He spotted the Land Rover, which was pacing them at about 35mph, and which he hailed again. “Graybeard! We’re gonna have to do a rolling transfer! Roll your old ass up here! You see me?” He waved. Graybeard waved back, with his gun; he then gunned the engine, swung out to clear the wing, and swerved back in.
And suddenly he was bouncing along not two feet away. He instantly started passing over full – and, as it soon became clear, enormously heavy – ten-gallon jerrycans of avgas. Fick took the first one and swung it back to whoever was behind him. As he reached for the second, the Land Rover bounced over a body and swerved. Fick leaned out – too far! – and his center of gravity took him out of the hatch. He hung on with one hand and one boot as he swung around and banged onto the exterior of the plane with his face.
Henno and Ali hauled him back in, fingers clawing at his webbing.
He braced himself better as the truck swerved in close again. He took the second can more carefully, passed it back, then two more after that. Taking a look out and forward, he now saw that they were nearly to the control tower – and thus the junction with the main runway. This was it. He put out his hand for Graybeard – who frowned down at the vehicle controls, trying to work out the cruise control.
“C’mon!” Fick bellowed. “No time!” He pointed to the turn, which was coming up fast.
Graybeard held up his index finger in a “one second” gesture – and finally got the cruise control set. He then tried to hand across his rifle. Fick swatted it away; it tumbled into the space between truck and plane – and then went through the propellers of the near engine.
Oh, God, no – fuck no…! Had he just fragged another engine? Fick watched the rifle get sliced into scrap metal and plastic. But in the end it seemed to leave the propellers no worse for wear. Tough old bitch. But Graybeard looked back, obviously extrapolating the rifle’s journey to his own.
He was now half in and half out of the driver’s seat, holding the wheel steady with his right hand. Fick held out both hands, feeling other strong arms around his waist – Henno and Ali behind him, keeping him from falling out. “C’mon!” Fick yelled. Graybeard looked once more at the enormous whirling propellers only a few feet ahead of him. He then looked beyond those – and saw the turn onto the main runway was upon them.
He leapt across the gap.
Fick grabbed him around the chest as his boots kicked out at nothing, then scrabbled and bounced on the tarmac racing by below. And at that instant, the pilot took the turn – causing inertia to pull at Graybeard’s heavily loaded body and try to pull it free of Fick’s grip. Graybeard’s legs flapped in open air, which did at least get them off the ground. Fick felt himself pulled farther out of the plane, over the blurring tarmac, and also behind the spinning blades, as he hung onto Graybeard with everything he had, and the Alpha guys did the same behind him.
The plane straightened up and immediately accelerated powerfully, all three remaining engines winding up to their ceilings. As the lateral inertia faded, Ali and Henno heaved backward and pulled both Marines inside, where they fell on top of them in an ungainly pile.
From his prone position, Fick keyed his mic and shouted, “FPF! Every bullet left behind!” The sound of firing, already insane, ramped up even further, audible even over the blasting engines. Those who weren’t shooting were still chucking things, tiny ones now, like individual water bottles and flashlights.
Fick tried to stand, but the acceleration of the plane pulled him toward the rear and he couldn’t manage it. They continued to accelerate like a bat not quite out of hell – not yet. Fick figured the pilot was going for broke: either they’d lift off by the end of the runway or they’d crash into the trees there. He felt the nose leave the ground, grudgingly. They continued powering forward like that, with the rear two wheels still on the tarmac, for a terrifyingly long time. Fick leaned forward, from where he lay tangled up with the others, and looked out the open hatch. He saw tarmac beneath them. And then he saw grass and dirt there, as the runway ran out and their smooth take-off turned into a rattle-and-hum nightmare.
And finally, achingly, the plane left the ground…
—and then almost immediately bounced and shuddered as its underside crashed into the tops of the burning trees that began out beyond the end of the runway. And then even that stopped as they cleared the forest canopy and began a 270-degree bank around to the right, to get them on a southeast heading – back toward the ocean, and the JFK.
Heading for home.
But first their loop took them back over the island, and the east end of the airport.
Fick looked below them and onto the half-destroyed top level of the control tower as they passed above it and to the right. And laid out in vivid detail, as if in a toy diorama, he could see all of the following: a carpet of mangled bodies scattered around the room; an improvised barricade in front of the door to the stairwell; the batshit cra
zy Canadian no longer bound to the wall, but up on his feet, facing the barricade and holding some kind of improvised melee weapon, maybe a length of rebar.
And finally the Kid, Corporal Chesney, back in his overwatch position, his shooting posture perfect, lying on his belly behind his gun, magazines laid out carefully beside him. And firing steadily and effectively down toward the swarming dead on the runway. Fick realized that the runway being clear enough for them to take off had been no coincidence, nor any stroke of luck.
It had been the result of one young man, doing his duty, no matter the personal cost.
But then all of that disappeared behind them, and the great expanse of Lake Michigan spread out below.
And Gunny Fick found that he still couldn’t get to his feet.
He didn’t have the strength.
* * *
But as he continued to occupy his spot on the deck, even as those he was tangled up with extricated themselves from under him, he found he had a good view from there up the entire length of the plane. And he could see the members of the two teams sprawled out together, catching their breath and licking their wounds, gearing down and patching up. Rekindling old acquaintances – or just getting used to the idea that they weren’t all going to die in the next few seconds.
Not everyone was there – both teams, not to mention the aircrew, had suffered terrible losses. But, still, Fick could make out Handon, Henno, Ali, Juice, and Predator, from Alpha team. And Brady, Reyes, and Graybeard from his.
In the middle of it all, looking rattled but as if he were trying to be brave, sat the scientist. The one for whom they had all performed such miracles, and suffered and sacrificed so much.
He’d damn well better be worth the price – he’d better work some miracles himself, Fick thought, his breathing slowly coming back down to normal.
A little farther up, he could see Alpha’s enormous assaulter and medic, Predator, working on Brady, getting his arm wound wrapped up. Fick thought he could hear Brady sniffle – was he crying?
“Jesus, dude,” Predator said. “Man up. You’re gonna be fine.”