“That was something you only see in those horror action movies. The woman’s eyes popped out of her head and flew over there, man. Holy shit! You are a beast!” One of his teammates said.
I regarded the man and raised my eyebrow. I was not in a fun time mood just then. “I am tired of calling you guy number one or two. What the fuck is your name?”
“Shit, sorry sir. I am Petty Officer Third Class Hayden, and this ugly looking savvy fucker we call Dodo. I’ll let him tell you the story later,” Hayden gave me a dopey grin.
I looked them both over, giving them a stone face. “From now on you are Dipshit one and you are Dipshit two. DP One and Two for short,” I growled out.
Both men shrunk back a little and then nodded, accepting their new nicknames. I wiped my hand on my pants, a caution I had started doing after touching the zombies. I pulled my SCAR up to my shoulder and stared through my Trijicon ACOG scope. Checking on the ground in front of us. I knew I was wasting our time sitting here in the open, but safety had jumped to the front of my mind.
“Hey Sasquatch, I know you think we need to stop and check on safety, but all you’re doing is wasting our fucking time. We have been trained to move fast, adapt, and overcome anything we run into. So why don’t you stop being a pussy and act like an SOF guy?” Nunzio spoke quietly, so only I could hear him.
I nodded my head and waved my arm out, inviting him to take point. He clapped me on the back and melted into the darkness. I moved off next, keeping a wary eye on the back of his retreating form. We moved like wraiths, never slowing down, or checking to see if the coast was clear. If I was going to be the big cheese for all of SOF, I needed to start trusting these guys and understand what they could do, which seemed to be anything they wanted to. A small light flashed twice from up ahead and extinguished. It would seem Kot or Hicks were on high watch looking out for us. Nunzio led the way into an open door and stopped just inside.
“Sasquatch hold up, DP One and Two head up the stairs and follow Hicks’ orders,” Nunzio pointed to the door with a placard announcing stairs.
DP One and Two ran past without a word, disappearing behind the door, and up the stairs as ordered. I closed the door and swung the little flimsy thumb lock that was not going to hold the door long from more than three dedicated and motivated zombies.
“We need to leave someone down here to guard the door, we will need a clear exit when we come out of here. You are the big cheese on the mission, who do you want to hold the position?” Nunzio asked me.
As I opened my mouth to tell him it was his team and he had operational command, a female voice spoke from the shadows behind us. “No decisions needed Sasquatch. I will hold the position, no worries.”
Nunzio and I locked eyes for a moment. Neither of us showed surprise over who the voice belonged to. I turned and gathered Kot into my arms. “You better be able to host that damn slumber party later girl,” I let her go and stepped back.
“No worries Sasquatch, I got this shit. Hey wanna play truth and dare too?” Kot answered back, throwing a wink up at me.
“Only if there is beer, popcorn, and periwinkle,” I moved away from her and toward a huge wooden desk. As I leaned over to put my arms around the desk, the two operators appeared next to me like they were going to attempt to help. “Step back, I would hate if either of you threw your back out,” I squatted slightly, made sure I had a good grip on the desk, and lifted it straight off the ground using my knees. Nunzio and Kot got the hell out of my way fast and watched with open mouths at my feat of strength. I put the desk down in front of the door and put it up on its end and pushed it against the door. “That should slow them down a couple of minutes.”
“What happens if you are not with us when we attempt to leave?” Nunzio asked hands on his waist.
“Adapt and overcome, you fucking swabby. Do I have to do everything?”
“You two need to stop wasting time,” Kot indicated with her thumb toward the stairs. “Get lost already, I need time to do girly things.”
Nunzio wasted no time, disappeared into the stairway, and legged his way up to the roof. I hesitated a moment and reached into my bag. When I removed my hand, I had two grenades. One a fragmentation, the other a white phosphorous, or Willy Pete as most operators called them and gave them to her. The Willy Pete would burn so hot it could slag an engine in a military truck. I was sure she could figure out something do with it. I bashed through the door without stopping and took the stairs four at a time. In a minute I was on the roof, just in time to watch DP One leap across the space between the buildings and grab onto the lip of our objective. He had a rope attached to him and was busily tying it to a hard point on his side. DP Two moved to our building’s antennae and scaled it till he was even with the hard point on the objective. He secured the rope quickly and then threw his legs over it and quickly pulled himself to the other side.
Nunzio and Hicks swiftly moved to the rope and scaled their way hand over hand. I was too big for that shit and it seriously hurt my shoulders and back doing that. I gauged the gap between the buildings and rolled my eyes. This was nothing for a man my size, I took a four-step run and leaped into the air. I cleared the lip easily and dropped to a shoulder, rolling to take my energy out of the leap. I skidded to a stop and popped up on my feet, SCAR instantly coming up to my shoulder and scanning the rooftop for danger. The rest of the team stood around me, arms folded, faces blank.
‘Whenever you are done with the hero pose and showing off Sasquatch, we should probably get moving,” Nunzio rolled his eyes.
“I give that little performance, a five at most for form, and a three for difficulty, but you did stick the landing, so over all a six,” Hicks announced.
“That was easily a seven you fucking puke. You couldn’t have pulled that off,” I stood up and walked past Hicks, knocking him with my elbow.
We stacked up the stairs to the entry door, my big ass in the rear again. Nunzio reached out and tested the door, found it unlocked and swung it open. He was driven back as two bodies barreled into him. DP One, moved to the doorway and covered the opening freeing up DP Two to move in and help Nunzio. I stayed in my position, waiting to see how things would shake out, I didn’t want to push my way in unless it was definitely needed. Nunzio had gotten his armored forearm up as he was hit, jamming it into the zombie’s mouth stopping it from advancing as it busied itself trying to bite through it.
The second zombie was the problem, it seemed the smarter of the two, as it tried to pull up the bottom part of Nunzio’s armor, to get at his unprotected stomach. DP Two fixated on the zombie attached to Nunzio’s forearm, leaving the second zombie time to get to its dinner. I moved forward quickly, pushed DP Two onto his ass and grabbed onto the collar of the Air Force uniform blouse and yanked back. The zombie was having none of it and turned its head in my direction and actually fucking hissed at me. Nope not ready for this shit. I pulled my Kabar from its belt sheath and calmly plunged the tip of the blade into its temple. The blade easily penetrated the skin, muscle, and bone stopping when the hilt hit the entry hole. I twisted the blade and stirred it around making sure to kill the damn thing. It stopped moving and I dropped it back on to Nunzio. I could hear DP One’s rifle firing just feet away, but figured he could handle himself, or he wouldn’t be on this team. As I switched my attention to the other zombie, it had released Nunzio and reached out with its gnarled hands, most of the fingers missing. I was so through with this shit, I was breathing hard and we hadn’t even entered the objective yet. I grabbed onto the back of the bedazzled, hip hugger jeans of the female refugee trying to grab me and moved her body away but kept a hold of her to control her movements.
“Your jeans are more bedazzled than a fucking rhinestone cowboy,” I flexed my bicep and launched her across the rooftop and to the lip of the small wall. She hit the wall at her knees and tipped over head first. If she could scream, she would’ve been screaming her head off, that is until she landed on the concrete.
; I turned to find Nunzio getting to his feet. He caught my eye for a moment and nodded his thanks. I returned the gesture, till my hearing came back and my brain came back on level. DP One was still firing into the stairway, DP Two stood at his side firing also, that could not be a fucking good thing. We carried only so many magazines, with a finite number of rounds. The longer we had to engage these things, the less rounds we would have to get out of this place. Yes, we had a pallet of supplies back at the Support Squadron, on the roof, but that was a little far away for us right now to be of any help. I moved up to DP One’s shoulder and examined the situation. A mound of dead bodies was stacked up at the stairway entrance, but as I watched, hands would appear and pull back the top of the pile. The zombies were having a problem disentangling from their situation. If they could not think this through, it was going to be a big problem for them.
“Please tell me one of you has some frags, I left mine with Kot.”
DP Two stopped firing and reached down to his vest, removed a metal ball and handed it to me before retrieving another one. I pulled the pin, released the spoon and threw the grenade underhanded aiming for above the pile of dead. It arced nicely up and over the zombies and their heads before bouncing downward toward the next landing. It exploded with a thump, before the echoing sound stopped, I snatched the other grenade from DP Two and repeated the process. This time I waited a moment, eating up some of the fuse, or cooking it off, before letting it go. This time, the grenade went off right behind the zombie pile. I waited a beat after the explosion and moved into the stairway, SCAR up and at my shoulder. This weapon was not very good close quarters battle CQB for most men. It was large, but so was I and this gun was prefect for me. I came to the pile of dead and launched a foot forward in a front kick. The top of the pile moved and then collapsed spilling backward and down the stairs. Nothing moved or hissed at me from the other side. I was a little worried at first about stepping on and through the dead pile, I didn’t want to be tripped up or bitten. I dismissed the thought, I was wearing high combat boots that would cover my feet and calves from being chomped on. I moved down the stairs not worrying about cutting the pie and making myself a harder target to hit. I knew Nunzio and his men had my back, and we were in a hurry.
I came to the third-floor entrance and waited for a moment. This was where Julie and her team worked, at least that was what I had been advised of, before jumping on the Osprey. I took in a deep breath to settle my nerves. I had become very close to Julie, while waiting for Dan to recover from his wounds. She was like a little sister that I loved very much. I wasn’t sure how I would react to find her dead, or as a zombie. Like I had been told so many times in my military career I didn’t have to like it, just had to do it.
As I reached out to grab the door handle, I found that it had been blown in. This was not a good sign. Someone had breached this door, and good guys or rescuers didn’t have a need to do that. I stuck my finger into the hole and pulled the door toward me. I raised my SCAR and moved in as fast as my big ass feet would take me. I moved forward allowing the rest of the team to come in behind me. I examined the hallway and found numerous empty brass shells lining the floor as well as tooled up and armored men, dead, I recognized none of them. I pointed to the piles and felt a fist pound me on my armored back. I stalked down the hallway and entered the big empty space in the middle of the room. This is where the team had slept, sleeping bags littered the floor. At the edges of the room sat the desks and computer stations.
Off to one side I found a pile of bodies, each one riddled with holes from numerous rounds. I recognized Master Gunny Sergeant Neal Mauseth, the grizzled old bastard Marine who had been on crutches last time I saw him, rested on top of the pile. I dropped my head in reverence and just knew the man had been the last to go down. He probably fought till the bitter end giving as much as he took. I took his hand and heaved his body down onto the ground.
“I need to identify each body, DP One, take out your camera and start cataloguing the room. DP Two take out your camera and take pictures of each body including the ass hats by the door. Nunzio, check each piece of hardware and see if any have power. Anything dead take out the hard drives and stuff them in your pack. Hurry up gentlemen, we made a shit load of sound and I am sure those dead fucks will be on their way,” I busied myself pulling bodies of the pile and lining them up on the floor.
A little piece of me died as I identified each person. Master Sergeant Maria Cruz, who had been in a wheel chair was almost unidentifiable with as much damage as she took, but I recognized her anyway. Next was a young wet behind the ears Sergeant Tony Torrez, he had only been twenty-three, but had left an impression on me with his can-do attitude. I was somewhat relieved when I got to the bottom body and not found Julie or Dan’s dad.
I stood up and placed my hands on my hips and surveyed the area. I roved my eyes over the walls, monitors, and computers. I saw a blinking red light coming from under a small bookcase and made my way over. I dropped to my knees and looked underneath it. A tablet laid there, as if someone had thrown it there. I know I have said I am a large man, and here is where my size gets in the way. I couldn’t slide my hand under the lip of the case. I came to a snap decision to lift the bookcase and toss it across the room in a fit of rage and frustration. I stood quickly and grabbed the sides of the case getting ready to move it when DP One came up and placed a hand on my shoulder.
“I got this big man,” DP One dropped to the ground and slid his hand and forearm under the case and snatched up the tablet. He pulled it out and handed it over.
I checked over that tablet I was not what you would call an IT expert, but I was not a total dolt. The tablet was a ruggedized Dell tablet, with a button on the bottom center. I pressed it and the screen lit up with a picture of Dan and Julie on it. I sucked in a breath of shock and quickly slid my finger across the screen unlocking it. The battery low message flashed on the screen letting me know it needed to be plugged in to be charged. Before the screen blacked out and it shut down, I read the note that was underneath the battery low message. The message was from Julie and said that they were being taken by Ridder. I shook the device frustrated at the battery and was ready to scream at it but thought better of it. I slid my pack off and buried the tablet in deep around the clothing inside.
“Yo, Sasquatch. You on the air? Over,” a voice came over my radio.
“Go for Sasquatch. Over,” I answered back.
“That horde is staying still out there, but a small group has come out of the shadows and are working on getting their way into the building. Over.” Dead Eye reported.
“How the fuck can you see that when earlier you couldn’t see the building really well? Over.”
“I am currently on the move. Looking for a better spot. Over,” Dead Eye answered back.
I stalked over to the window and peaked outside. I could see the shadows moving toward the building. “Dead Eye get to a spot from where you can cover our retreat. Break, Kot what is your situation? Over.”
“Things are quiet down here right now. Over,” Kot answered back.
“Hold station, we are finishing up here, and on our way out. Over,” I let go of the PTT button on my radio and turned to my team. “Nunzio, we need to get out of here, right now. Drop all other tasks, we have what we came for.”
Nunzio nodded his understanding and motioned for DP Two to go out into the stairway. The rest of us quickly followed out into the stairway. I motioned for Nunzio to go up first, and that I would take the rear. He shook his head back.
“No Bueno Sasquatch, you have the intel we came for. I will take the rear, DP One and Two protect his ass,” Nunzio pushed his way to the rear and held his position at the landing as I and the two DPs ran upward.
As we moved to each landing the DP twins would secure it and move forward allowing maximum protection for yours truly. We made it to the roof with no opposition and stood by the access door waiting for Nunzio. Shots suddenly echoed up the stairway and out the open
door.
“DP Two, get in there and backstop Nunzio. DP One, you and I will provide support for their escape,” DP Two nodded and took off back into the stairway as DP One and I took opposite fields of fire into the stairwell.
As we waited, I dropped to a knee and while keeping my barrel pointed to the door, I adjusted my pack with my other hand and tightened my straps. When we egressed off the roof I may not have another chance, and with all the moving and jostling the pack had become loose. The clap of an explosion came out of the door shortly before a small cloud of dust, then Nunzio came through with DP Two close on his heels. They were shouting and pointing to the other roof nearby and motioning for us to move.
“Go, go, go!”
I moved out of my kneeling position just in time to witness those faster zombies come pouring through the stairway’s door. I fired off three quick single shots and was rewarded with three dead again zombies. They collapsed at the door, creating a small barricade for the dead meatbags following up behind them. The pause didn’t last long though, as others started climbing over them. I turned on my heel and took off, legging it for the ledge of the building. I was soon in the air flying over the small gap as if I was fucking Superman. I cleared the gap and four feet of the other roof before taking the landing on my shoulder and doing an airborne roll over my head ending back on my feet, weapon in my hand and pointed back toward the incoming zombies. They hit the roof’s ledge and without the balance or brain power to know to jump, they tumbled off, and down the side of the building they went like lemmings over a cliff.
“Kot, we are coming down. Is everything still secure?” Nunzio called over his radio.
“Secure, but I am engaging Zs. They started hitting the door right before you radioed. Over,” before she let go of her PTT steady firing came over the radio.
Zombie Theorem: Dark Times Book Five Page 9