Ravage

by MacCraw

  The silence of Fort Ybarra was too much to bear. Whenever there was silence, something destructive was usually close behind it. The calm before the storm.

  A lone Englishman named Kirkley was in a dilemma. He had to take his time searching through Fort Ybarra, but he couldn’t make too much noise, lest he want to attract the dog soldiers. He had a powerful bullpup L85 assault rifle, but the bullets weren’t fatal to the wolf men. They stunned them, true, but regular old bullets or buckshot pellets just made them stagger before getting back up and sprinting towards the shooter, claws stained with blood and teeth dripping with saliva.

  When the dog soldiers attacked, the soldiers across the United Kingdom held down the forts firmly, but as the attacks persisted, sometimes even hours apart from one another, the ammunition began to whittle down along with the soldiers. The few stragglers left decided to spend what could potentially be their last hours of existence moving south, instead of staying put waiting for imminent death. They loaded their last few vehicles with as many troops, weapons and supplies as they could, and set off for Italy, where it was rumored that there was a solution being developed, or at least a defense, against the wolf men. Still, nobody’s heard of the remnants of the military of Scotland.

  Kirkley knew he had to be as quiet as possible, because if the dog soldiers found him, he wouldn’t stand a chance. A pack of immortal wolf men with monstrous teeth, razor claws, and supernatural strength would easily rip apart one lone human with an assault rifle that might as well have been a child’s toy gun. His holdout group, consisting of three men, himself included, and two women, were counting on him to recover more supplies, ideally food; their food stock was all but depleted. Still, if Kirkley found any full ammunition magazines for any of the group members’ weapons, there wouldn’t be an ounce of hesitation to snatch them into his carryall backpack. Kirkley was the strongest member of his group, and the de facto leader, which is why he was always going out to get the group’s supplies.

  Kirkley perused the old fort, and found what he very desperately needed to find: the barracks. Even though the layout of the group’s previously-looted military compound was different than Fort Ybarra’s, the principle was essentially the same: the barracks always had weapons, ammunition, food, or all of the above. The problem was that the doors were locked. Judging by the sound made by the other side of the door, Kirkley deduced that somebody on the inside had placed a board or pipe between the door handles, rendering it unable to open from outside or inside. What Kirkley quickly realized is that whoever locked them had to have done it from in the building, and there was a possibility that the person might’ve come through a sunroof or a window or something. Kirkley quietly crept around the perimeter of the building, searching for any sort of entrance. No such luck. There were windows, but they were boarded up from the inside.

  If the windows were boarded, and the doors locked, then somebody could potentially be in the building. Kirkley switched the safety off of his assault rifle, and fired a short, controlled burst at the window and boards. The bullets cut through the wood like scissors through paper, and Kirkley quickly dove through the window, into the small building. The rifle wasn’t equipped with a sound suppressor, so somebody – or something – could have easily heard the gunshots. The dog soldiers had enhanced hearing and scent, so they could literally run a mile in a minute, tracing the origin of the sound that they had associated with prey. And much like sharks, they could detect the slightest drop of blood from far away.

  As soon as Kirkley was situated, he slung his L85 and began to snuff around for any worthwhile supplies. The barracks contained 5 rooms, excluding the showers, and in ascending order from the door to the end of the corridor. The first room had two cans of unopened soda, a can of ravioli, a boot knife, a damaged 9mm pistol, and a bottle of water. Kirkley stashed the consumables and moved to the next room, which contained nothing. Kirkley opened the door to the third room, which had a few handgun magazines of varied caliber. The fourth room was overwhelmingly full of weapons and ammunition: three shotguns, two assault rifles, two submachine guns, four handguns, and a plethora of ammunition for said weapon types. Kirkley took every STANAG magazine he could find, as well as a few magazines for Samantha’s MP5A2 and Pack’s G3 battle rifle. Hell, if he led the group here, they could easily hold out for at least two weeks.

  The fifth and final room yielded a horrifying discovery, which was the corpse of the soldier who barricaded himself within the barracks. There was a hole in his head, blood everywhere, a gun that had slid out of his hand the moment he pulled the trigger. In his lap was a note, which Kirkley read.

  “Date: Unknown. Sergeant Bailey, part of 2nd Platoon, A Company, holding out in Barracks A-2. My bastard mates left me to die at the jaws of those furry wolf men. Fortunately for me, and unfortunately for those twats, I pilfered one of their supply crates, taking a bunch of their weapons and supplies. There is supposedly some hope in this dystopian world, however. It is rumored that down in Italy, military engineers are developing special bullets that will enable us to slay the dog soldiers. That’s what the rumors claim, but with my broken arm, and the weather getting colder, I fear it is only a matter of time before I meet a foul end. I take my life, hoping that the spirits who cursed mankind in this time of darkness will show me some mercy and sympathy.”

  Kirkley silently nodded, placing the note in the dead soldier’s pocket and shutting his eyes before sliding him under one of the bunk beds. It was far from a proper burial, but it would prevent those damned wolves from desecrating his body.

  “Speak of the devil”, Kirkley thought upon hearing a long, drawn-out howl. Kirkley shut the door in a hurry, locked it, and hid under the other bed, leaving his carryall next to where he hid the dead soldier. Before hiding, Kirkley took out two magazines for his assault rifle, and prepared to open fire on the wolf man who would soon track him down. Kirkley waited, not even blinking. He kept his eye down his SUSAT optic, prepared at any moment to open up on the 7-foot dog soldier.

  Through the door, he heard a quiet, grumbling snarl, and the remnants of the glass in the window shatter. The dog was now in the building, and it was prepared to systematically search the barracks. Every time the wolf man put a foot down on the linoleum floor, Kirkley could hear its overgrown claws click against the floor, and its deep, heavy breathing. The dog soldier finally reached the door to the room Kirkley was hiding in, and began rattling the handle. It quickly realized that the door was locked, and from there realized that somebody had locked the door. And if somebody had locked the door from inside, then there was food behind the door.

  Ferocious, determined clawing against the door sounded like the painful screeching of nails on a chalkboard. It made Kirkley flinch in pain, his ears and skin tingling as the monster made this monstrosity of a noise. When the door had been scratched thin, the beast began punching the door with unrelenting force, managing to bust through it. The moment Kirkley saw the whites of his teeth, he opened fire on the dog soldier, blasting it with a overwhelming volume of 5.56mm gunfire. As the automatic rifle buzzed and rang as it fired, the dog soldier staggered backwards, before backing against the wall. Kirkley watched his opponent’s scarred and bruised skin regenerate as he reloaded his weapon as quickly as possible. Round 2: the wolf man lunged for Kirkley’s neck, snarling ferociously, but Kirkley dove out of the way, causing the beast to hit the wall. Kirkley quickly slammed the door and tossed his final stun grenade into the room as the dog rose to its feet. The grenade went off, painfully stunning and disorientating the dog soldier.

  Kirkley took these precious seconds to grab a box-fed shotgun and two seemingly custom-built drum magazines for it from the fourth room before lunging out the window and sprinting back into the woods to his group’s hideout.

  …

/>   Completely exhausted, Kirkley stumbled his way back to camp, which was situated on a series of old bunkers on a cliffside overlooking the ocean. If he and his companions weren’t being hunted by packs of wolf men, then he might be able to enjoy the beauty of the world around them, and the gorgeous view of the ocean from the mighty cliffs.

  Sitting up in a tall tree was Poet, the sniper. Poet never told anybody her name, nor did she have any intention to. She was a very quiet woman, a trait that definitely aided her in sniping. Her skill was far beyond unmatched, for she could pin a dog soldier straight in the forehead on a windy night from a mile away. She rarely talked, but what she had to say was always worth listening to.

  “Any wolf men in sight, Poet?” Kirkley called. Poet shook her head.

  Kirkley continued through his camp, heading over to the fire where the group’s chef, Samantha, was cooking dinner for the team. “Hey, Kirkman”, Samantha said, nodding to him as she grilled a juicy looking steak over the firepit, “Did’ja find anything worthwhile in Fort Ybarra?”

  “Aside from a dog soldier and a dead man, I found some pretty good loot”, said Kirkley. “Some canned food and drinks, more ammo for our five-five-sixes, more ammo for your MP5, and some ammo for Captain Pack’s G3. I also got this shotgun and some drum magazines for it.”

  “It could definitely come in handy”, Samantha remarked.

  “For close encounters”, said Kirkley.

  Kirkley dug into his backpack and handed Samantha the magazines for her weapon, as well as all of the food and water. “I’ll make sure this gets distributed to the team”, Samantha said.

  If Kirkley were to die in the battle against the dog soldiers, Samantha would be an excellent leader. The tall woman with short brown hair put everybody else over everything else, and would righteously give her own life to save theirs. She was an excellent cook, and made delicious dishes even with the scarce consumables available to them.

  “Hey, Kirkley”, Terry said, waving to his friend and personal role model, “I heard some gunshots in the distance, did you run into any trouble?”

  “I might have made a new friend or two”, Kirkley remarked.

  If Kirkley was Batman, Terry was Robin. Terry looked up to Kirkley, and did his best to imitate his behavior. Kirkley understood that, like Robin, Terry had lost his parents, and it was during the team’s disastrous mission to a nearby village that they found Terry. They’d lost Ryan and McEvoy, so they were down on manpower and were eager to get some more. One of Terry’s strongest characteristics was his emotional imbalances. Terry could get very excited and energetic, but he was also quick to panic and get worked up, and these two characteristics had an oil and water relationship with each other.

  Kirkley continued through camp, opening the trapdoor down into the bunkers built during the war, and heading to Captain Pack’s room, which was positioned in an overlook of the ocean. Captain Pack, once a soldier fighting proudly in the British Armed Forces, deserted after his special forces unit was annihilated in a disastrous invasion in the Middle East. Pack was another potential leadership figure, but his strength was his knowledge of weaponry, and his proficiency with a plethora of firearms and calibers was invaluable.

  “Captain?” Kirkley asked.

  “Kirk, you’re back”, Pack said, calmly inhaling and exhaling as he listened to the sound of the ocean waves and seagulls squawking.

  “Yeah. I made a, uh, ‘new friend’. Everybody bites back, and he sort of had a sharp set of teeth.”

  Pack ferociously swung around as he whipped his sidearm out of his chest holster, pressing the barrel of his handgun into Kirkley’s forehead.

  “Pack! Pack! Pack! I wasn’t serious!” Kirkley shouted, “Stand down.”

  Captain Pack slowly lowered his pistol before putting the gun back in his chest holster. “Sorry, Kirk”, said Pack, “I thought you’d been bitten or clawed. False alarm. What all did you get from Fort Ybarra?”

  “I got a few cans of sustenance that I gave to Samantha, as well as some fully-loaded magazines for her MP5”, said Kirkley. “Plus, I got two magazines for your gun.”

  Kirkley tossed Pack the 7.62mm magazines, which Pack caught. Pack placed them in his satchel, before resuming his conversation with Kirkley. “What do you have there?” he asked, pointing to Kirkley’s shotgun.

  “Found this shotgun in a huge stockpile in the barracks at Ybarra. Picked up two drum magazines for it, not counting the one already loaded. Know what it is?”

  “SPAS-15, can go pump or auto”, said Pack. “Very versatile weapon, that is. Definitely hold onto it, because it might come in handy.”

  “That’s not the only thing that’s going to come in handy”, Kirkley commented, “I’ve got some-“

  “Wolf pack incoming!” Samantha screamed. Gunshots soon followed. Kirkley dropped his SPAS-15 and readied his L85 as Captain Pack bolted out the door with his G3. A mixture of varied calibers of gunfire erupted as the howling of monstrous wolf men tore the silence apart. Aiming down the SUSAT scope of his L85, Kirkley trained the tip of the obelisk post onto the beastly head of one of the dog soldiers and fired. A large volley of 5.56mm ammo sprayed over the wolf man’s face, taking an eye out and causing blood to rain down from the creature’s face. The wolf sprinted off into the dark, misty tree line, where it could regenerate safely before returning to attack the sitting ducks.

  “Reloading!” shouted Kirkley, as the depleted magazine of his assault rifle hit the forest floor. Kirkley slammed a fresh new magazine in as the dog soldiers blindly charged the campsite. Poet fired a rifle shot into the heel of one of the wolf men, which caused it to stumble forward and fall. The beast almost immediately got back up, and began charging towards Poet, but Pack intercepted it, smashing it with the butt of his battle rifle and following it up with numerous single shots fired in rapid succession that almost sounded like lightning bolts.

  Terry’s energy was unleashed after a long time of relative tranquility, and he immediately began fighting with a spirit of fire as the wolves rushed him. Terry held his pump-action shotgun at waist level and never stopped blasting the wolves. However, his fate was sealed when his weapon ran out of ammo. Since reloading was completely impossible with the dog soldiers swarming him, Terry was forced to use the shotgun as a blunt instrument, shouting and laughing as he smashed the wolves with the stock of the weapon. However, his momentum was quickly broken along with his shotgun when one of the two wolves attacking him threw a straight punch that snapped through the shotgun and slugging him in the chin. Terry was momentarily stunned, and the wolf took advantage of this, grabbing the boy’s neck with its muscular hand. Squeezing Terry’s neck with unrelenting force, barely keeping him breathing, the dog soldier threw Terry against a tree, breaking his spine with a painful crack. The wolf man grabbed Terry’s ankles, and hauled him off into the darkness. Samantha was the only one to witness this gruesome death, but she couldn’t put too much focus on it lest the same thing happen to her.

  Samantha was firing from a prone position with her submachine gun, positioned on top of the bunker. Despite firing the lowest-caliber weapon, her bullets were stunning the wolf men with great effectiveness. In fact, she seemed rather excited, and laughed as she held down the trigger. She was so zoned out that she didn’t notice the dog soldier slowly raising its claws behind her. Before the beast could butcher the unaware human, Kirkley leapt down from a tree, kicking the dog soldier in the jaw and knocking it backwards. When the wolf stumbled backwards, it sent Samantha tumbling as well. The beast and the beauty rolled backwards, towards the edge of the cliff. Samantha’s weapon went hurdling over the cliff, falling to the crashing waves below, as Samantha herself clung on for dear life, with the wolf man holding onto her ankle. Kirkley furiously fired into the wolf man’s face, causing it to release the girl and plummet to its presumed death. Kirkley grabbed Samantha’s wrist just as she couldn’t hold on much longer, and pulled her to safety.

  By the time Samantha and Kirkley had run
back over to the camp, Poet and Pack had finished driving off the wolves, which suddenly broke off their attack.

  “Did you get them all?” asked Kirkley. Poet nodded in affirmation.

  “…Where’s Terry?” Kirkley asked nervously, noticing that there was a head missing.

  “They took Terry”, Samantha sighed. “He was covering Poet, and one of those things snatched him from behind and dragged him screaming off into the darkness.”

  “Fuck!” Kirkley shouted, kicking the dirt in frustration. “We’re one man down, we just got bushwhacked by the dog soldiers, and we’re low on ammo, just after I made a voyage to the fuckin’ barracks and very nearly died doing so!”

  “Kirkley, please”, Samantha pleaded, gently pulling on his shoulder. “We’ve got to stay strong.”

  “I know”, Kirkley sighed, “But it’s pretty tough when you lose somebody who has been at your side for two years in our last stand against the wolf men.”

  “Speaking of which”, said Pack, “What summoned them here?”

  Poet broke the silence without speaking a word. She immediately got up and grabbed the cooked steak that Samantha had been cooking, before wastefully pitching it over the side of the cliff.

  “It was the steak”, Samantha deduced. “The scent of the grilled steak lured them in. Either way, they know where we live now, so we really should think about packing up and moving out.”

  “Where?” Pack said, with a crack of desperation in his voice, “This is the only safe place left in Scotland. That town we went to was completely full of the dogs, and both McEvoy and Ryan died there. We were all lucky enough to get away, but they weren’t. And now Terry’s dead, and Samantha lost her weapon, and they know where we are, and we’re all gonna die! They all died, and I couldn’t save them.”

  “Captain”, said Kirkley, “Calm down. You can’t focus on what was. Act on what is. We need you to stay strong, because if the dog soldiers divide our numbers up again then we’re done for. The four of us need to stick together. We honor the fallen by staying alive.”