Ravage

by MacCraw

  Samantha walked back downstairs to Kirkley and Pack. “All clear upstairs”, she reported, slinging her shotgun. “There’s three bedrooms, and a bathroom with a window in it. I checked it out, and it has an excellent view of the yard and the surrounding trees. If Poet were to sit on the toilet – with the seat down, of course – with her rifle, she could do some major damage to the dogs.”

  “Good to know”, Kirkley smiled.

  “The fridge is still running”, Captain Pack announced. “The means of which are unclear, probably a generator in the wine cellar, but the important thing is that there are a few water bottles, cans of energy drinks, and leftovers that smell like shit cooked in a colon.”

  “Alright, lads”, Kirkley said, standing up to address his brother and sister in arms, “We got away from the wolf pack safe and sound – well, sound, at least, so we should get some rest while we still can. Any volunteers for sentry duty downstairs while two of us get some sleep?”

  “I’ll look after Poet”, said Pack. “Samantha, you and Kirk get some rest.”

  “There’s a large bed upstairs”, Samantha smiled. “Looks mighty comfy.”

  …

  Kirkley and Samantha were both worn out, primarily because of the assault that knocked Poet unconscious, but because of something greater. Just as the bipedal dog men that hunted them were soldiers, working together; dedicated to the kill, so were the humans. The humans traveled as a team; dedicated to staying alive long enough for the Italians to create the edge that was very badly needed across England.

  Kirkley loudly cracked his neck as he rotated it around. Running and ducking and rapidly moving from A-to-B without any sort of relaxation would make a man very tense and constricted. Samantha was the same way, but since she was more agile than Kirkley and Pack, she probably didn’t have to worry about tension as much as the men.

  “Mmm”, Kirkley groaned as he stretched and took off his tactical vest and other burdening clothes, “Samantha do you feel as bad as I look?”

  “You don’t look that bad, Kirkman”, Samantha grinned. “But I feel tense. Very tense. Every part of my body is aching, everything is so tight.”

  “Every part?” Kirkley asked in somewhat of a seducing way.

  “Ohhh yeah…”

  Kirkley knew what was going to happen next, and he had no qualms about it. In a desperate struggle to survive, there was still time for pleasure, and still time to love and embrace. Kirkley dimmed the bedside light as Samantha slithered into the bed. Kirkley propped his L85 against the bed, and after he finished removing his clothes, he entered the ring, ready to spend some time as an intimate lover, not just a renegade fighter. To make love, not war.

  …

  While Kirkley made love to Samantha, Pack was forced to sit downstairs, his rifle between his legs and his thumbs idly twittling. With no beasts in sight, nobody to chat with, and Poet still unconscious, he was beyond bored. Hell, if he weren’t so loyal and faithful to his friends, he might’ve fired a shot off just to get the dogs to come to the farmhouse, so he could start spraying bullets into their furry asses.

  The one thing Pack couldn’t stop thinking of was Terry’s gruesome, preventable death. Pack had a close, strongly-forged bond with Terry despite an initially rough first impression, and losing Terry was like losing part of himself. And when he thought of Terry, he thought of his company during the War in Takistan.

  17 weeks before the dog soldier massacre, Captain Pack, his team, and a large regiment of the British Army were fighting for supremacy against the Middle Eastern Coalition for control of Nuwari, Takistan, a nation founded in claimed territory in Turkey, Iraq and Syria. It was one of the longest conflicts ever fought in history, with tremendous casualties to both factions.

  Captain Pack was bred for war, some say. He was a brave soldier who became so caught up with the battle, that sometimes he thought he had died and gone to heaven. As much as he enjoyed shooting evil forces with maximum, accurate firepower, his men were more important to him. Left Hand Bobby, “Boots”, McKendrick, Jester, Sykes, and Reynolds were all members of his personal squad, and dear friends of his. They were more than friends, in fact; they were brothers.

  After the German air forces struck the major enemy installations in Tabriz, the British Army infantry were assigned to immediately enter the city and remove any dug-in pockets of resistance. Tanks and helicopter gunships were on immediate standby. The transport helicopter carrying Pack’s special forces squad – the “Six-Pack”, as he liked to call it, was flying in formation with about two dozen other helicopters, loaded with the rest of Captain Pack’s unit.

  “Alright, lads, who’s gonna keep count of their kills?” Pack asked, trying to keep his boys motivated and enthusiastic.

  “Sykes, you do it”, Reynolds, the gruff machine gunner said, playfully punching the marksman in the shoulder.

  “Piss off”, Sykes snarled. “Why don’t you do it, Reynolds?”

  “I’m just too busy blasting them to keep count”, Reynolds laughed.

  “This is Hammerhead 1-2”, a voice over the helicopter radio announced to the troopers within, “We’re approaching the city. ETA 30 seconds! Welcome to paradise, rockjumpers.”

  “Time to get-it-ON!” Reynolds shouted, cocking his light machine gun.

  A loud beeping was heard: a missile lock.

  “Guess those MEC don’t take too kindly to-“

  The anti-aircraft missile struck the helicopter, shaking it around violently like a magic-8-ball. In the quaking, Captain Pack was struck over the head by the fire extinguisher in the troop bay, knocking him unconscious.

  “Pack’s down!” Left Hand Bobby shouted in panic.

  “We’re goin’ down!” the pilot announced as the helicopter went plummeting towards a building.

  The helicopter smashed through the upper floor of a building, completely demolishing the wall. The engine sputtered as it quickly died, and the bent propellers slowly stopped spinning.

  “We have to… keep… moving!” Reynolds said, trying to clear the wreckage.

  “Get the captain!” Jester shouted. McKendrick and Sykes dragged their incapacitated officer out of the wreckage. The men escaped the downed chopper in time, just as it began to slide out of the building and crash down into an alleyway.

  “That was close”, McKendrick gasped.

  Before his mates had any time to react, a bullet flew through the window, penetrating his combat helmet and his head. McKendrick slowly dropped to the ground. In a fury, Reynolds ran up to the window and squeezed the trigger of his machine gun, spraying out bullets with a loud, cycling rattling. Whoever was taking shots at the Six-Pack was completely suppressed by the overwhelming volume of gunfire.

  Reynolds ran out of ammunition in about 15 seconds, and ducked down below the window to reload. Completely by surprise, an enemy grenadier launched a 40mm HE grenade launcher shell at the wall, which exploded and crumbled apart, destroying Reynolds along with it. With the gunner down, Boots, Left Hand Bobby, Sykes and Jester were the only survivors still fighting. Captain Pack was still alive, however, and was coming to as a team of insurgents ran up the stairs and mercilessly gunned down the remaining British soldiers. To avoid capture or execution, Captain Pack continued feigning death, but deep down he was being crushed by serious anguish. The deaths of all of his men were all his fault, because in their state of panic without their brave leader to guide them, they didn’t have any chance of surviving. Pack survived, but he would always be haunted by the deaths of his men.

  How he escaped the disastrous NATO campaign against the Middle Eastern Coalition, Pack never could recall. But the less remembered, the better off he was emotionally.

  …

  Kirkley suddenly shot up from bed, wide awake. He heard gunshots and screaming, mixed up with howling and roaring. Pack and Poet were making a futile final stand, and from downstairs, Kirkley heard Pack’s final words: “Kirk, they’re coming for you!”

  Kirkley panicked and sea
rched for his weapon, which was nowhere to be seen. Samantha was still in bed with him, but she was sound asleep despite all of the racket. Kirkley’s heart was beating as quickly as a hummingbird’s wings as the dog soldiers ran up the elderly stairs, sprinting down the long corridor, and lunging straight through the wooden door. With no weapons at all, and completely naked, Kirkley was helpless, and would be completely unable to defend himself. The large white dog, the one that was the leader of the wolf pack that had been pursuing the team, was standing between him and Samantha. Kirkley watched in drowning sorrow as one of the wolves stood next to Samantha and plunged its teeth into her neck, slowly cracking it with a loud, juicy crunch. Blood sprayed over Kirkley as the wolf howled in victory, before the wolf man standing before Kirkley moved in for the kill.

  …

  “NO!” Kirkley shouted, springing out of his nightmare and back into the real world.

  “Kirkley, what’s wrong?” Samantha asked in concern, quickly grabbing the machete on the bedside table.

  “It was… it was a nightmare.”

  “Kirk, you’re awake!” Pack shouted from downstairs. “Can I come up?”

  “Um… give us a minute”, Kirkley hollered back.

  “Oh my God, do not tell me you’re fuckin’-”

  “We’ll be down in a second!” Samantha called. “Patience, Captain!”

  Samantha sighed. “Impatient sonofabitch. Kirkley, I’ve never felt so alive. For such a rough, tough wolf slayer, I had no idea you could be so gentle.”

  “I’m gentle to you, Samantha”, Kirkley smiled, kissing her hand. “As for the dogs, well… I go medieval on those motherfuckers.”

  …

  “How are you feeling, Poet?” Pack asked as Samantha and Kirkley walked downstairs together, “Feeling any better since your concussion?”

  Poet lightly nodded. “…Yeah. I’m feelin’ better. Where… where are we?”

  “We’re in a farmhouse. We’re safe – for the moment, anyway”, Kirkley explained. “Good to see you back up, Poet. Your weapon’s over there. There’s a bathroom on the second floor with a window. It’ll make an excellent sniping position. I want you to go up there with your rifle and provide overwatch.”

  Poet picked up her gun and walked up the stairs with it. “Your turn to get some sleep, Pack”, said Samantha.

  Pack had no response, and remained motionless as his fixated eyes gazed down the iron sights of his weapon. “…We’ve got company…”

  Kirkley followed Pack’s line of sight which led him into the eyes of a dog soldier standing motionless in the tree line. The wolf was slowly breathing, and it never blinked.

  “Should we fire, Kirkley?” Samantha asked with concern in her voice.

  “I feel that if we fire now, then we could be in some serious trouble”, Kirkley answered.

  A bang was heard from the back door. “Ohhh shit”, Samantha shivered. The banging and rattling became more frenzied, and loud clawing scratched and scraped against the door. All of the tension and anxieties that Samantha had prior to making love to Kirkley had returned, more potent and mentally venomous than before. Kirkley held his breath as he aimed down his L85’s optical sight, holding his breath longer than most trained snipers could. Poet was still silent as usual, but she wasn’t firing, and there wasn’t any sort of loud smashing or ruckus, so Kirkley knew she was still intact.

  The noises against the back door abruptly stopped. A second later, there were multiple loud noises of shattering glass. “There they go, over there! Get ‘em!” Pack shouted as the metallic cycling of Pack’s battle rifle, rapid buzzing of Kirkley’s assault rifle, and the clanking sound of Samantha’s shotgun shredded up the silence of the farmhouse. The wolf men sprinted through the gunfire and exploding trinkets, framed photographs, fine china, and glass casings. Kirkley’s weapon, though it had a larger magazine size than Captain Pack’s weapon, had an extremely high rate of fire, and was going through its ammo like there was no tomorrow. Within about five seconds of nonstop firing, the firing came to a stop as Kirkley was forced to reload. Kirkley released the empty magazine, which dropped to the ground as he shoved a fresh magazine into the L85.

  “Fall back! Bedroom! Get to the bedroom!” Kirkley hollered. Samantha provided covering fire for the team as Pack and Kirkley ran up the staircase and down the corridor. Samantha fired from on the move as she backed up the stairs. As Samantha moved past the bathroom, she stumbled backwards as a dog charged her. Before the monster could completely shred her to pieces, Poet heroically charged out of the bathroom, using her sniper rifle as a battle club and slugging the beast with aggressive brutality, snarling as she hit it.

  “Go!” Poet cried. Samantha crawled backwards before rolling onto her belly and leaping up off the floor. After she hit the wolf with the rifle, she used it as a brief barrier, but the dog soldier snapped it in half with its beastly strength. Poet pulled out her sidearm and kept rapidly pressing the trigger, dumping bullet after bullet into her attacker. After about 7 shots, the wolf fell backward, giving Poet the opportunity she needed to rejoin her team in the master bedroom. The moment Poet dove through the doorway, Pack slammed the door shut as Samantha and Kirkley slid the bed in front of the closed door, preventing it from opening. The dog soldiers furiously hacked and slashed at the door, determined to slaughter the humans. Poet and Kirkley frantically searched through the cluttered second bedroom in search of anything that they could use. Fortunately, they found something that would definitely prove useful: a propane tank.

  “Hack at the bedroom wall!” Kirkley ordered. Pack and Samantha furiously banged against the wall, crunching and cracking it as much as they could so they could have somewhere to place their improvised breaching charge. After several seconds of frantic beating, they lodged the tank into the wall as far as it could go.

  “Back against the wall!” shouted Kirkley. He fired a burst from his rifle, all shots striking the tank, which violently exploded and blew down the wall.

  “I’ll huff, and I’ll puff, and I’ll blow your house down!” Samantha cheered.

  “Go, go, go!”

  The quartet leapt down from the rooftop and ran around the house, making a panther dash for the dirt road leading away from the overrun farmhouse. Within a short period of time, the dog soldiers realized that their prey had gone around them, and within a few seconds, they ran back down the stairs, dove out the window and ran towards the survivors. They were more determined than before, realizing that since they were faster, stronger, more agile and more durable than their prey, being out in the open would make this a very short final stand. Still, the dog soldiers were very badly injured from all of the bullets the humans had been blasting them with, and their high endurance made them more resistant, but not entirely.

  “We can’t stop them!” Samantha shouted as her shotgun continued loudly blasting.

  “Hold the line!”

  The old dirt road went around a hill, and a light could slowly be seen rising from behind the ridge. A SUV was turning the corner, and this was of immense interest to the fleeing humans. The vehicle made a quick U-turn and halted, presumably to let the survivors in. Kirkley opened the doors as fast as he could, and the team frantically packed into the car while Kirkley covered them. Once all heroes were aboard, Kirkley himself jumped in as the young woman driving the car floored it, burning rubber and slinging dirt into the faces of their attackers as the car drove off.

  “We’re grateful for your assistance”, Kirkley sighed as he checked through his magazines.

  “You guys were lucky”, the woman with bright eyes, fair skin and multi-toned dyed brown and natural blonde hair said. “My group and I heard gunshots earlier, and we knew that somebody was in peril.”

  “Thanks, ma’am”, said Captain Pack. “Do you have a name, madam?”

  “My name is Hannah”, she said.

  “Pleased to meet you, Hannah”, Kirkley sighed. “You said you had a group of survivors with you, yes?”

  “T
hat’s right. Myself, Logan, Riley and Connor. We’re dug in at Fort William, and we’ve got plenty of ammunition and supplies. If you lot want to join us, then we wouldn’t mind. Strength in numbers, just like those dog men”, Hannah explained.

  “I’m gonna take you up on that offer, Hannah”, said Kirkley. As Hannah drove, she noticed that Kirkley was still smiling at her.

  “Why are you smiling at me like that?” she asked with a slight bit of concern in her voice.

  “Oh, I was staring?” Kirkley replied, shaking his head. “I get that from my father. We called it ‘the stares’, where you just totally zone out and look at something; not just another human being, but an inanimate object, sometimes even one of the wolf men.”

  After the awkward moment with Hannah, Kirkley looked over to Samantha, who seemed to be in pain, and was moaning quietly.

  “Samantha, you alright?”

  “Oh, uh, yes, yes”, she lightly nodded. “I took some damage from the blast, that’s all.”

  Kirkley believed her, but he couldn’t escape the feeling that there was something else wrong with Samantha. Trying to get his mind off of his suspicions with Samantha, he turned to Captain Pack. “Captain, what’s our current stock?” Kirkley asked.

  “That siege totally blew through our ammo”, Pack reported. “Pretty much all of our rifles have one spare magazine. Just one, each. It’s a good thing that our new friend has ammo, because we’re really going to need some.”

  …

  Hannah’s truck pulled over to the gate, where a tall man in a sweatshirt stood watch. Hannah waved to the man, who opened the gate, allowing Hannah to drive the exhausted members of Kirkley’s team in. They pulled up next to the headquarters and got out of the vehicle. The survivors were truly worn out and physically battered: Samantha was still in pain, supposedly still aching from the explosion that saved their lives; Poet still had a pulsing headache, and Captain Pack was out of breath and had a sore throat.

  “Get your men in there”, said Hannah. “I’ll have Connor look after your folks.”

  “Cheers”, Kirkley replied.