Dissension nw-6

by John O'Brien

  Sandra sends a message asking the one to answer and tilts her head as if this will enable her to better receive his response. Although she can still see the images emanating from him, she doesn’t get a reply. She tries once again receiving the same silence. Frustrated, she shifts minutely and continues to watch.

  Standing excitedly as she sees the one open a door that leads inside, she stops herself after taking a few steps in the direction of the two-legged lair. The door is open and their den is vulnerable. She looks to the sky to gauge how much time is left of the darkness. They haven’t been out long and most of the night remains. If we can just get over the walls, we can enter, she thinks, feeling an eagerness rise within. I’ll watch to see if he can get over the walls. Perhaps he’ll show us a weakness and a way in.

  Sandra becomes even more interested as she observes in her mind the one’s departure from the building and into the night. He isn’t making directly for the walls as she thought he would. He is running under the starlit skies for the far side of the walled lair. She senses his objective is a large door leading through the walls. Literally quivering with excitement, she calls to her pack telling them to forget what they’re doing and come to her. They all rise from gathering the furred rodents and look in her direction in a questioning manner. Hesitating for only a moment, the large pack drops what they are doing and quickly surrounds her.

  Sandra leads them in a fast run in a wide, looping circle around the walls toward the metal gates she remembers seeing on her one circle around the lair. This must be where the one inside is heading. The one inside is jogging slowly toward the gate and the pack settles in the woods a short distance from the large portals. Keeping the pack out of sight of the walls, she edges forward, stopping just as she senses the strange one struggling with something heavy that is keeping the doors shut.

  Her heart is racing with anticipation as she witnesses one of the large doors move. It opens only an inch or two. She maintains a watch on the gate and soon it swings open farther. The one emerges from the opening. Sandra can barely contain her excitement. The way into the two-legged compound is open. Now’s her chance.

  She sends a quick image of the female to her pack with the instructions that she is to be taken alive. Kill any who stand in their way but the capture of that is their goal. “Getting the female is a priority over feeding. Grab her and go. We’ll leave immediately when we get her. No stopping to feed,” Sandra sends.

  With that, the pack launches forward out of the woods toward and then through the gate.

  “Sergeant Watkins!” Watkins hears his name shouted from downstairs.

  He leans over the railing and sees one of the people manning the night watch in the control room standing at the entrance. The person waves frantically upon seeing him. Bounding down the stairs, he enters the control room. Looking at the monitors lining one of the walls, he immediately understands the urgency of the shout. Hundreds if not thousands of night runners fill three of the screens. Most are still emerging from the woods on the far side of the road leading to the entrance but they are speeding toward the gate.

  The sight causes his heart to leap in his chest and adrenaline floods his system. What makes him catch his breath is the camera showing the front gate slightly open with one person standing just outside. The way into the compound is open and a horde of night runners are on their way.

  “Wake everyone!” Watkins says to one of the operators and turns in a flash. His last sight of the monitors before bolting from the room is of the first of the night runners beginning to pour through the gate.

  With the alarm given, the teams emerge from their cubicles. Their sleepiness wears off quickly as they slip on their vests and gather their gear. Forming into their teams, they begin to take their prearranged positions established in case they ever experience a breach of the walls and sanctuary. The interior turns from the quiet of peaceful slumbering into a madhouse of shouts, tromping boots, magazines being loaded, and weapons locked and loaded.

  Those not on any of the teams emerge with panic-stricken looks but shuffle off to the upstairs dining room and surrounding area giving the soldiers the freedom to move and shoot at will. They lie on the hard, chilled linoleum floor with hearts racing and eyes wide with fear. They’ve all practiced this numerous times but now it is for real. Practice may make it easier to move into position and know where to go but it doesn’t help with the sheer terror of actually having to do it.

  Watkins stands next to Lynn and Drescoll telling what he witnessed on the monitors. “There are thousands of them on the way,” he reports.

  Lynn knows they won’t be able to get updates from the control room as the outside cameras were moved to provide coverage along the length of the walls and haven’t been replaced. There just weren’t enough cameras on base to provide coverage for the walls and the building. They had planned to locate more from the naval bases farther north but higher priorities overrode those plans.

  Lynn and Drescoll stand near the upstairs railing arranging the last of their gear on their vests and checking their weapons. The teams are all just coming into their positions along the upper railings as the first loud shriek sounds downstairs, filling the vast interior with its echo.

  Sandra watches as her pack streams by her. She is running along with them but allows many of them to pass. She knows the two-legged ones are dangerous and she will lose many in her pack but they are numerous. Among the eagerness and excitement she feels, she relishes in the fact that she was right and Michael wrong. A part of her sees this as an opportunity to take them all down once and for all but she has a specific quarry in mind. It overrides any other thoughts.

  They will vacate after they capture the female. Deep down, she knows the wrongness of this with regards to the overall pack. An opportunity like this won’t appear again. She thinks of keeping up the attack once she has the female and eliminate them all. The thought of feasting on all of the two-legged ones she smells brings about an overpowering, salivating hunger. The odor of them also induces rage. She’ll have to control her pack tightly if she is to accomplish what she wants tonight. If the two-legged one is inside, she will capture him as well. She doesn’t sense him but will direct the pack to him if she senses or spots him. If that opportunity arises, she will kill the female once the two-legged one is captured. She’ll have to play this night as it comes.

  She rushes past the strange one by the gate. He stands as if embracing the pack. She senses some of her pack turn on this one. He feels the same as them but carries the scent of one of the two-legged. Sandra hears his cries of pain but doesn’t care and runs on. He’s fulfilled his purpose.

  His heart is beating fast… he is free. The night air somehow seems cleaner, fresher. Alan is so eager for the hunt he is almost salivating. He wants that sweet taste and to feel flesh in his mouth once again — sweet, raw meat. And to be with a pack once again; to be safe and secure both in knowledge and numbers.

  He senses a large pack waiting in the nearby trees across the hard path and watches as they emerge. He sends a call but doesn’t receive any response from them. The leading ones race past him as if he isn’t there and continue through the opening behind him. Alan smells them for the first time. They have a different scent than he remembers. It’s the odor of unwashed, musky bodies and not the familiar aroma. He stands confused as they flow by him, looking left and right for any sign of recognition. The strong female he sensed the other nights runs by him with only a cursory glance.

  Fear begins to surface and he’s not sure why the others aren’t acting like he is one of their own. He senses their eagerness to be inside and feed but that shouldn’t cause them to completely ignore him. Among the picture images he is receiving is something about a particular female inside but that is quickly shunted away as his alarm grows.

  The others of his kind continue to stream by. The night is filled with their screams of hunger and excitement. Turning to the front, Alan is shaken by a transformed one directly in front of
him snarling and coming directly at him. The image fills his vision and he begins to raise an arm to fend the one off. He quickly realizes there is more than one coming at him. His heart kicks up another notch as he recognizes the hunger in their eyes. The one directly in front slams into him. Alan feels himself knocked backwards and begins to fall. His vision of the transformed ones flowing around him turns into one of small, bright lights above against a velvet sky. He impacts the ground on his back and his head rocks back hitting the hard pavement below. Stunned, he is only vaguely aware of growling bodies on him.

  He is brought back to full consciousness by a loud scream of pain and realizes it is own. Coming out of his foggy state, he is aware that he was walking in his sleep again but this time, he is not merely downstairs but surrounded by snarling faces. He feels agony beyond compare. A fleeting memory surfaces of waking in the crowded room of what he has become to know as night runners. This feels the same only, instead of the night runners chasing him through the building, they are on him, tearing into his flesh. Another thought intrudes through the pain, that maybe this is just another one of his nightmares. However, he has never felt pain in them before and it was usually him doing the biting and rending of flesh.

  He screams as he feels another set of teeth sink into him and tear a chunk of flesh off. The white-hot agony races through his body like electricity and his flailing to remove the night runners from him weaken. All thoughts he had flee and his mind is now only filled only with the redness of sheer agony. With his eyes squeezed close and teeth clenched hard, he arches his back as another strip of flesh is torn free. Suffering beyond belief envelopes his mind and body. His mouth is closed so tight that only a whimper escapes but the agony is too much. His back falls back to the ground limply. Darkness invades and his last breath escapes in a puff of white mist.

  Inside the once impassable walls and rushing through the tall grass, Sandra sees her goal. It rises above her surrounded by the hard ground the two-legged ones seem to favor. Her desire builds with each step through the field. She is trying to sense the two-legged one inside but is coming up empty. With the grass stalks brushing against her as she races through the open air, she directs her pack to the back where she saw the strange one exit hoping the door will still be open.

  It will take some time to get her entire pack through the smaller opening but she is relying on her numbers to overwhelm the two-legged ones inside. She’ll wait for a moment outside until they break in and through. It wouldn’t do for her to be taken down in the first moments. She knows she will lose a few tonight but it will be worth it. Her pack means a lot to her, as does her young one, but this urge she has is overpowering, she needs for it to happen.

  The building looms large but not as large as the ones where Michael has the large pack. She sees the first of her pack race around the corner and disappears down its length. They are close to being inside and she feels her heart pounding with anticipation. Being open, she feels Michael intrude on her thoughts and she immediately shuts back down. The last thing she needs right now is his interfering with her plans. He may send others to her and, although that would be helpful, it would also mean that the female or the other two-legged one that has held her thoughts for so long would be killed and eaten. That, she can’t allow.

  Sandra turns the first corner leading to the back trailing a large contingent of her pack. She senses the leading ones as they turn the far corner at the rear and sees the entrance inside still partially open. They throw a door that slides up and down farther open and enter. Feeling almost light-headed with the excitement of them entering, she knows she is so close.

  She turns the last corner and sees her pack as they crowd the portal, pushing to get inside. Sensing their craving and rage that the smell of the two-legged ones brings, she sends a sharp reminder that they are not to feed and their goal is to find and capture the female. Sandra stops by the side of the door through which her pack is flowing, watching them struggle to get in. More of her pack arrives and crowds the entrance even more. They are streaming inside so she doesn’t feel the need to slow them. It’s the onslaught of numbers that will make her attack successful. Her mouth waters with the thought. The first shriek echoes from inside.

  Startled by a shriek sounding out inside the building, Lynn feels the jolt of additional adrenaline pour into her system. She expected to hear the pounding of night runners against the solid steel security doors. The sound of one actually inside stuns her and dread fills her mind. One inside means more on its heels.

  That thought is verified as the first shriek is quickly multiplied by others. The once silent interior is swiftly filled with the screams of night runners emerging into the interior downstairs. She knows they are coming from the warehouse. Watkins’ report of thousands of them fills her with a dread she hasn’t ever known. Lynn takes a deep breath knowing that if she lets fear take hold, they are all doomed.

  “They’re downstairs coming from the warehouse. All teams reorient to cover the entrance. Cover the stairs and escalator. No one makes it up,” she shouts into the radio.

  Lynn watches as some teams change their position and soon the shouts of the team members join the din of the night runner screams. The leading edge of the horde of night runners arrive and are brought down by a volley of gunfire. The muted sounds of the gunshots are lost in the vast noise filling the interior. The only evidence that rounds are streaking out to their targets are the night runners falling to the ground. Others push from behind and leap over the fallen bodies of their comrades.

  Lynn sets herself up with Black Team by the large set of stairs leading upward. There are only two ways up and she has directed some of the teams to cover those chokepoints. The others she has set up to thin the mass of night runners pouring in downstairs. She knows their relentless nature so they must keep them from getting upstairs. Some screams from the others crouched by the dining room and kitchen areas add to the massive volume of noise filling the sanctuary.

  Night runner dead and injured pile up under the balcony, brought down by the substantial amount of gunfire pouring into their midst. Still others behind them come and they slowly advance regardless of the amount of rounds streaking into their midst. Soft flesh and hard bones are torn apart by the forceful impact of rounds slamming into them. Some of the injured attempt to crawl away but are trampled by the ones pushing from behind.

  Slowly, the mass of night runners forge ahead in the face of the volume of fire. Magazines clatter to the ground as the soldiers reload. Night runners appear in all quadrants under the balcony as they spread out in the lower interior. Hundreds lie on the ground but are lost in the racing horde. Still they come. A fleeting thought occurs to Lynn wondering if they have enough ammo. The screams emanating from the other survivors force that thought from her mind and spurs her on.

  Sandra feels many of her pack vanish from her mind. The crowd around her stretches far around the corner of the building and she senses they have gained some ground. Still, she feels the loss of so many deeply. This must be done but she wishes it wasn’t at such a great loss. She’ll need a host left after this to capture the two-legged one and to deal with Michael if he tries anything. Not that there’s much she can do as his pack is so much greater than hers, but she won’t give up her prize willingly.

  Looking to the stars twinkling in the sky, she knows they have enough time left in the evening but they will still have to be quick. She has to yet find a lair for her dwindling pack. Turning back to the door, she clears a space and enters.

  Coming into the actual interior from the large room just inside the door, the full din of noise assaults her ears. It’s so loud she wants to cover her ears to diminish the almost painful volume of it. Her pack crowds the downstairs under the upper level. They are brought down as soon as they enter and she senses rather than sees a growing pile of bodies. Shrieks from her pack resound in the large, open space; shrieks of hunger, rage, and pain. She edges around the sides under the overhang, looking upstairs
over the heads of her pack. Seeing some two-legged ones as they rain death upon her pack, she searches for one of them in particular.

  She continues around the perimeter searching upward. The stink of the two-legged’s guns fills her nose as does the iron smell of blood as it pours from the wrecked bodies of her pack. She is anxious and dread surfaces that she won’t be able to find the female. If she doesn’t, she’ll take the secondary goal of killing all of the two-legged ones. A hint of their aroma ascends above the other odors and she feels rage begin to build. The anger is both an inherent one from the sight and smell of the two-legged ones and from the damage they are doing to her pack.

  Keeping the rage under control but feeling it just below the surface, she edges farther around. Her eyes widen and her heart leaps. There! Above by the stairs on the far side. Sandra sees the female she saw through the two-legged one’s mind so many nights ago. A mixture of emotions filters in. She doesn’t have many, but those she does have mix — hunger, anticipation, rage, and a feeling that would be most associated with glee. She directs her pack to that single set of stairs and shows them an image of the female and her position. The pack responds with a louder chorus of shrieks.

  Lynn sets her small crosshair on yet another target. The room is filled with the acrid stench of bodies torn asunder and gunpowder. The upper balcony has a haze from the smoke ejected with their rounds. They are keeping the night runners at bay for the moment. Hundreds have fallen yet there is still a multitude pushing from behind. They haven’t reached the escalator as yet but they are attempting to scale the elevator. She and Black Team have been holding the wide, wooden stairs clear and the bodies lying at the foot of the stairs attest to their ability to do so. The bottom four steps are lost from sight under the carnage they are continuing to inflict on the horde attempting to gain the upper levels.