Crawlerz | Book 2 | Batten Down The Hatches

by Merritt, R. S.

  That didn’t in anyway imply the men weren’t up to the task. They were all highly trained counter insurgency operatives. Members of various branches of the special forces. They’d all been under fire in their past lives. They just hadn’t ever been chased around in broad daylight by half-naked teens moving with lightning speed to try and bite their heads off. LeBron and Drew were seasoned veterans compared to the super masculine apocalypse noobs on the base. They’d both found it amusing when they’d been told the escort was being provided for their protection. Especially when the first thing the weapons covered soldier had asked was if they’d actually seen a surger in real life yet.

  A serious benefit for working for the department was the gear. In addition to being reissued some of their personal weapons they’d also been allowed to check out a couple of electric motorcycles. On top of looking pretty badass the bikes packed some serious zoom. Twisting the throttle sent you silently hurdling forward in seconds. In true military fashion they’d spent a day being trained on the motorcycles before being allowed to take them out. This had included a quiz based on a manual with more information about the bikes in it than they’d ever possibly need to know. At a hundred grand a pop it wasn’t like the custom-made Harleys were cheap.

  Between the pandemics, the terroristic bioweapons threats and the fear of some sort of climate disaster the department had been flush with cash the last few years. Politicians in charge of slush fund money felt pretty good about shifting some of it over to an organization dedicated to keeping the government going in case of a cataclysmic event. They signed some papers and hundreds of millions of dollars was quietly appropriated and spent on facilities like the one in South Carolina. Facilities equipped with gigantic EMP proof warehouses with enough gear in each region to hopefully allow the United States to recover from just about anything it was possible to recover from.

  None of the members of Blaze’s clan were authorized to see the inside of the warehouse. They only knew it existed because equipment like the motorcycles was rolled out of it. Drew had asked a loose lipped guard he’d been hanging out with about it. The guard had asked him if he’d ever seen the warehouse at the end of the Indiana Jones movie. When Drew nodded in the affirmative the guard smiled and nodded his head. Whatever the hell that meant.

  Drew stayed behind his brother to make sure LeBron didn’t manage to crash the six-figure cycle. Leander hadn’t blindly picked them for this mission. They’d been armed and given valuable tech. Leander wasn’t going to do that for people he thought may simply take off once he let them outside the gates. He had their sister Yue somewhere and knew they weren’t going to leave until they knew where she was. All he would tell them was that as long as they did what they were told their sister would be in a nice, safe place away from all the dangers of the road. They’d had no choice but to nod their heads and agree to do whatever they were told. If Drew ever got the opportunity Leander would be up against a wall with a blade to his throat telling them how to find their sister or he’d have a new hole to breathe out of.

  For now, they were going to be helping the Department of Magical Mysteries or whatever the hell organization Leander was James Bond of to protect what was left of the southeastern portion of the United States. Their mission was to give the survivors in this region the capabilities of surviving and fighting back. Leander’s team would arm groups of survivors and act as the liaison to the rest of the US fighting forces. For now, the goal was to regroup and survive. There’d been about five hundred million people in North America when the crawlerz came across the border. If just one percent of those had managed to survive then there should be at least five hundred thousand people left. That was more than enough to rebuild given time and a solid defense against the enemy.

  A lot of the special forces team were trained on dealing with bioweapons. A few of them had been to epidemiology training sponsored by the CDC. LeBron had listened intently as they’d explained that out of the half billion people in the country at least half had very likely made the transition to become crawlerz. That meant that North America could be crawling with about a quarter of a billion of the supernaturally fast freaks. No one was retaking the country anytime soon.

  Best case they could round up the survivors and start building safe havens. Walled fortresses the infected couldn’t get into where they could grow food and lead normal lives. It’d be a few generations before they could actually inhabit most of the country again. It wasn’t like the threat was going to die out anytime soon. The original crawlerz in that gigantic crypt in Egypt had been thousands of years old and they’d still been kicking.

  Leander had attempted to motivate Blaze’s band of felons and misfits to aid in the cause. It would’ve helped if he hadn’t drugged them all and taken their women and weapons from them while they slept. His excuse that he’d been ordered to send the women back to the fleet for their own safety hadn’t set well with the clan at all. Although they did agree that if he’d just asked them nicely without drugging them it probably wouldn’t have ended well. An uneasy truce had sprung up with Blaze allowed to remain in charge of what was left of the clan as long as he took orders from Leander. It was pretty much the way the ex-CIA agent Leander had been trained to build out a rebel army. Or, at least it was now that he couldn’t just hand them bags filled with cash and cocaine.

  They’d been sent out on a trial run to see how well they could work together. One of the things Leander’s forces didn’t have a lot of was experience outside the gates of their little private fortress. The clan had that in spades. This first mission was a road clearing mission. LeBron had a winch mounted on his bike they were going to use to remove any vehicles on the roads leading to the base. Taking care of infrastructure like the roads was going to be a critical part of getting the United States functioning again. Drew imagined Leander had a checklist of things he could start accomplishing. The dirtbag was probably sitting in his bed at night happily looking for the ones that would take the least effort. He seemed like the kind of guy who’d like to report to his superiors that he was making rapid progress whether it was real or not.

  Drew glanced back over his shoulder confirming he could no longer see the surger. He slowed down and keyed the mic on the side of his helmet to let the other two riders know he was stopping. Both of their brake lights come on as soon as he finished his transmission. He waited on his bike as LeBron and the Marine both performed tight turns on the road to end up sitting beside him. Drew was loving the helmets. They could talk to one another and not attract the infected.

  “Alright Flanagan you ready to waste one of these things?” Drew asked the leatherneck who was sitting on his bike staring down the road in the direction they’d left the surger.

  “You think it’s still chasing us?” Flanagan asked.

  “They don’t stop until you kill them, or they get sidetracked. That thing will be running down this road for the next three days. The reason we’re stopped here is because it’s better to take care of it now when we’re expecting it than later when we’re not.” LeBron answered.

  Flanagan clicked the button to shoot down the kickstand on either side of the bike and climbed off his space age hog. They stood there staring down the road for a minute before the surger finally appeared from around the curve. Flanagan nestled his heavy barreled AR-15 into his shoulder and sighted in on the tweaked-out teen speeding towards them.

  “You guys normally go for headshots?” Flanagan asked idly. He’d been nervous about going out into a world full of monsters from his nightmares. With a rifle pressed to his shoulder and an enemy charging to kill him he was back in his comfort zone. He waited calmly for an answer while he tracked the monster charging for them. It’d poured on the speed as soon as it saw them. It’d also started screaming out a challenge.

  “That’s just in the zombie movies. Unless it’s an easy headshot, we normally just go for center of mass and put them on the ground. They die eventually and we save bullets.” Drew answered.


  Flanagan grunted an unintelligible reply before sending a round downrange. The surger had been in the middle of a leap to try and get to them even faster when the bullet caught it in the gut. It kept running towards them without even slowing down. Flanagan waited a second then sent another round. This one smashed into the monsters chest and put it on the ground. It started to stand back up then fell to the ground and lie still.

  “Well that was different.” Flanagan said into the mic before getting back on his bike. He flipped the button to pull the electronic kickstand up then with a flick of his wrist he was hurdling down the road again.

  There really weren’t that many cars for them to pull off the roads out here in the middle of nowhere. The exercise basically let them test out the capabilities of the bikes and get used to working with one another. Flanagan was happy for the opportunity to finally get off the base. He’d been pulled out of his team and reassigned to the continuation group about three days after the first group of archaeologists had become infected in Egypt. Someone in the government had been paying attention for once. Not that there was a lot they could do about it.

  They pulled a grand total of four vehicles off the road. Only one of the cars was really even blocking the road. They went two hundred miles out and two hundred miles back on a single charge of the custom-made oversized batteries. Other than the one surger they’d killed they didn’t see any other ones. It was late afternoon when they pulled back onto the road leading to the base. Flanagan made the comment that it hadn’t been all that bad.

  “That’s because it’s daytime. When the crawlerz come out at night it’s a whole different story.” Drew told him as they rolled up to the gate and waited for the guard on the camera to see them and press the button to open it up. They rode into the base proper once the extra tall gate slid smoothly open.

  LeBron saw the gate as an issue. If they’d been coming in hot with a mob of the infected chasing them then the gate opened and closed way too slowly to keep the fast-moving creatures out. That could wind up being the base’s Achilles heel. There was always the possibility the base sported an advanced command center setup with video feeds to watch the surrounding area to prevent that from happening. Considering the kind of money that the government had dumped into this place that wouldn’t have surprised LeBron at all. For the moment he just let himself enjoy the secure feeling he got when that gate clicked shut behind them.

  Drew was torn. He’d already been dealing with his sister and brother being taken away from him by Blaze. He’d slammed them into confinement in a different truck. He’d been working on adjusting to that situation when they’d rolled into this top-secret base in the middle of nowhere. These dirtballs had drugged him, kidnapped his sister, and now were making him go risk his life to clear off roads. The worst part of it all was if they hadn’t kidnapped his sister, he’d have jumped into this effort headfirst.

  Drew loved the idea of working with the government to reclaim their country. If they’d mailed him a brochure to come join the zombie fighting corps, he’d have been all over it. He loved working with and learning from guys like Flanagan. Leander was a complete douchebag but that was just something you had to deal with sometimes. The whole situation would’ve been vastly improved if Leander hadn’t drugged them all and kidnapped his sister. Holding his sister as a hostage to force him to fight didn’t jive well with Drew’s sense of right and wrong. He doubted Flanagan or any of the other military men walking around thought it did either.

  They rolled their ridiculously expensive bikes underneath the metal awning sticking out from the hangar at the edge of the small airfield. There were charging ports there they had to hook the bikes up to before cleaning them off and covering them with tarps. The man on duty in the warehouse came out and collected Drew and LeBron’s weapons. They each had a special duffle bag to put their personal gear into. Neither Drew nor LeBron loved the idea of walking around sans weapons in the middle of the apocalypse, but they didn’t have a lot of room to argue. Drew knew he personally wouldn’t mind shooting Leander in the leg repetitively until Leander told him where his sister was being held. He’d more than likely let that sentiment show on his face when talking to the ex-spook.

  “Hey man. How do you feel about being part of a group that drugged a bunch of people and kidnapped the women who were with them?” Drew blurted the awkward question out to Flanagan. They were in the middle of the dirt field between the barracks and the airstrip. It’d been bugging him the whole time. He really liked Flanaghan and didn’t understand how such a standup guy could be part of something sleazy like that.

  “You mean besides wishing they’d kidnapped the men and left the women.” Flanagan snapped back with a grin. His grin disappeared quickly when he saw the look on his companions faces.

  “Those women included my sister.” LeBron said turning his head to look away. Unlike Drew he could care less about being in the zombie fighting corps. He just wanted their family back together again. He was a bit worried at the hero worship he saw in Drew’s eyes anytime his older brother looked at the special ops soldiers. Drew had always been looking for a place to belong. Standing beside those elite fighting men was a good fit.

  “Yeah.” Flanagan stopped walking to look them both in the eye. “The rest of us were following orders. That was one hundred percent our fearless leaders idea. We went along with it because it made sense. You weren’t leaving here after randomly rolling into our top-secret bat cave. We couldn’t just kill all of you. Locking you up’s a waste of resources. Honestly, I think it turned out pretty good. Your sister got sent somewhere safe and you guys get to fight beside us for life, liberty, and whatnot.” Flanagan resumed walking. Drew and LeBron stayed stationary for a moment considering what the man had just said. It sucked that it made sense. Maybe they’d been looking at this all backwards?

  The entrance to their barracks loomed in front of them. One of the special ops guys was stationed outside of it on guard duty. He looked like the picture of boredom. He nodded at Flanagan as they got closer.

  “Get some?” He asked.

  “Got some.” Flanagan replied.

  “That was some pretty intense dialogue back there.” LeBron joked after Flanagan walked them through the barracks door.

  “We’re going to read each other poetry later.” Flanagan answered.

  They walked down the tiled hallway with their boots echoing loudly. The interior of the building was much bigger than it’d appeared from the outside. It’d been built into the side of a hill. Or the hill had been added on top of it. Either way you couldn’t tell how large the building was from looking at it from outside. Flanagan took them past the door to their barracks into the administrative section. They sat down around a long conference table with a large screen TV set in the wall up at the front. They hadn’t sat down for more than a minute when Special Agent Leander walked in.

  Drew was surprised at how visceral his reaction to the sight of the man was. He felt his rage-o-meter heading rapidly into the Hulk degrees. He wanted nothing more than to stand up and knock the stupid looking grin off the face of the man who assumed he owned them now. As a trained field intelligence operative with a ton of experience in the field Leander saw that look in Drews eyes and instantly recognized it for what it was. He considered the best way to address it as he walked over to a small cabinet and pulled out bottles of water for each of them.

  “Is this poison or just more knock out juice?” Drew asked.

  “It’s water.” Leander answered crisply. “How’d the road clearing exercise work out today?”

  “It worked out fine sir. There really wasn’t that many cars to be moved. I’ll write up a brief later, but we only encountered one hostile. The bikes held up and performed well. LeBron and Drew here both know what they’re doing out in the field. We can learn a lot from them.” Flanagan answered quickly before Drew could start running his mouth again.

  “Excellent. Any observations from either of you?” Leander asked.

/>   “The gate sir.” LeBron said.

  “Excuse me?” Leander turned to stare at LeBron. He patiently waited for him to explain.

  “The front gate. If we’d been coming back with a bunch of surgers chasing us they’d have come through right behind us. Either you have video and infrared surveillance all around the base or you’re taking a major risk every time you open the gate to let someone in. Also, what if one of us had been bitten? We all could’ve been bitten actually. Not likely but possible. I think recent events have shown us very clearly we need to plan for the unlikely.” LeBron answered. He answered articulately through the clicking noise his jaw made every time he moved his mouth. That was a souvenir of his initiation into Blaze’s group.

  “My career has been built around preparing for the unlikely so I’m in complete agreement with you. I also get why Blaze said you were wasted out in the field and should be used more as an analyst. I thought he was just trying to protect you so you could heal up from that smashed jaw. Turns out he was just telling the truth. I guess I’m just not used to hearing the truth so directly.” Leander said leaning back in the generic conference room chair. The government auditors had allowed the group to buy hundred thousand-dollar motorcycles but no way where they going to allow for the more expensive chairs.