“Oh, no, man…” Pred said, reaching to grab his arm.
But the broad smile stretching Juice’s beard out said he wasn’t going to be deterred.
“Great,” Pred said. “Thanks, assholes.”
“Wha’ we do?” Savard asked.
Pred just shook his head.
* * *
When the order came down for fifty percent watch, Jameson didn’t protest. While sitting on the walls in the rain was a better and safer duty than One Troop had gotten anytime in recent memory, his Marines were still in dire need of rest, feeding, and just a little time off the damned line. He let Croucher decide who got relieved first, but then found himself in a fight about who stayed with them to command.
Croucher was bigger and meaner. So he won.
Mainly, Jameson was too tired to argue with him. So he relented, and took himself to the rear. However, he didn’t go with the men. He made an excuse about needing to coordinate with command in the JOC, before slipping away alone. And he did head for the SHQ building, and even went to the top level, dragging his exhausted body up another four flights of stairs, wondering if this place didn’t have a damned lift. But he didn’t go to the JOC. And it wasn’t coordinating with command that he needed to do. What he needed was to be alone.
To reflect. To think. To try to process everything.
Steering clear of the JOC, he found a little unused office on the top level of SHQ, one with a view back out over the prison, the walls – and what was left of London beyond it. He laid down his weapon, took off his vest and body armor, and sat down on the back edge of the desk, facing the window and looking out into the darkness beyond. He put his boots flat on the desk chair, and his elbows on his knees.
And then he put his head in his hands.
God, he was so tired.
But then he laughed out loud – to remember something from earlier. It was when Simmonds had finally come back, a little later than Croucher, from their mission to secure the armory – another successful tasking for One Troop, in an unbroken string of them. Croucher had grinned, and said:
“Simmonds here blew up a Redcap.”
This made little sense, so Jameson had asked him to explain. When he did, Jameson just shook his head. Nothing was shocking anymore, much less surprising. And then Croucher had mussed Simmonds’s hair, though he did it by shoving his helmet around on his head. And he said:
“Didn’t know you had it in you, you vicious little minx.”
Jameson somehow couldn’t stop laughing at this. It was the exhaustion maybe. Finally the giggling fit subsided. Really, what he couldn’t understand was how his men carried on – and kept making jokes like that one, kept their sense of humor, through everything. Despite the brave faces, the heroic stamina and resilience, Jameson knew his men were completely exhausted – body and soul. He knew they were, because he was, too, and they had taken every step he had.
Clearing out the Channel Tunnel had been followed by the brutal street fighting and carpet-bombing in Canterbury, and then the mission to undead Dusseldorf, which had been so costly. And then, literally sixty seconds after they touched down from that one, One Troop alone had to save CentCom from that first outbreak. Then, after that, running the base and the whole war, which was relieved only by the Moscow mission – their dodgiest, bloodiest, and most costly of them all: three men dead, three left behind. And then finally the Battle of the Gap in the north, where by some miracle they’d only lost one more – but it had been Sergeant Travis, one of the troop’s most senior and best-loved men.
It was just like Jameson had told Eli back in Moscow: Another one of the old boys bought it today.
Now, Jameson felt the creasing bullet wound in his right arm throbbing again, like a heartbeat. It was like a reminder, repeating every second, of the men who had fallen in Moscow, and the ones they had left behind – worst of all Eli, who had been, in every way, the heart of the outfit. But Jameson had to tear his mind away from that thought. It was still too painful, even now in this moment of reflection. He was afraid grieving for Eli would cause him to fall apart.
And he couldn’t let that happen.
He thought instead of the mad flight south through London after the Wall fell, holing up in the Gherkin, fighting like maniacs all the way to the top level – and then across ten feet of open air, five hundred feet above the ground, to the waiting Fat Cow. The only reason any of them were still alive was that Charlotte had disobeyed orders and flown there alone to rescue them. And the only reason Jameson was among them was that Charlotte, and everyone else in One Troop, had simply refused to leave him behind. After the most harrowing escape any of them had ever seen – in a long and death-defying unit history – they had gone back one more time, every single Marine in the unit leaping back through open air into a completely overrun building.
All for him. Just to save him.
Now Jameson’s laughter was replaced by tears, leaking slowly from the corners of his eyes, even as he tried to fight them. But he managed to shut it off. It didn’t matter that he was alone in the dark. Infantry officers didn’t cry. He couldn’t.
Anyway, he knew the giggling and the crying had the same cause: complete and total exhaustion. And if his Marines were even half as tired as he was, they had to be on the verge of collapse, of just lying down and dying – wrecked physically and, even worse, mentally and spiritually.
No one could keep this up forever. Not even One Troop.
Surely it was someone else’s turn now? To let his men lay down their burdens – and for someone else to take them up, and finish the job of saving the world. But Jameson knew it didn’t work that way. He knew that, just like in the march across Europe in World War Two, they all kept going until the Third Reich – or in their case the Reign of the Dead – fell once and for all.
Or until all of them did.
At least One Troop, or half of them, were getting fed now, conceivably getting showers, and maybe even a couple of hours of rack. But none of them were going to get any proper rest. Jameson knew they were never coming off the line. Not until it was over – one way or the other. And somehow they were going to have to find the strength to see this through – all the way to the end.
But he honestly didn’t know how they were going to dig down again. He didn’t know where they were going to find anything left in the tank. After a certain point, everyone falters. Sometimes, you just have nothing left. And so he was pretty sure he knew what it was about when the door unexpectedly knocked and opened.
“Ah, there you are, sir.”
It was Colour Sergeant Croucher. In tow, he had Corporal Sledge, who had been promoted to leader of Third Squad after Travis went down.
“Why aren’t you on the line?” Jameson asked.
“We need to speak with you,” Croucher said quietly.
So this is it, then, Jameson thought. They’re going to tell me the men are done. That they can’t take anymore.
He rose and followed them out, slightly numb and docile, just waiting for it, as they descended three flights of stairs, spiraling down toward the lobby. But when he turned the corner of the last landing, and looked out and down on the big lobby and atrium…
There were two neat ranks of men standing perfectly erect.
It was all of One Troop – all that remained.
Jameson looked over at Croucher. “Don’t worry, sir, we got some squaddies to spot us on the line for ten minutes.” He turned and spoke crisply down to the formation:
“Parade – ATTENTION! Slope – ARMS!”
The Royal Marines braced up and stood at attention, then brought their rifles to their shoulders. When Croucher turned back to Jameson, both he and Sledge were smiling. “We’ve got something for you, sir.”
Jameson just blinked in the dim light. “Is it an armored division – and two months’ leave on Cyprus?”
“No, sir. Just this.”
When Jameson looked down, he saw Croucher was holding an olive-green rectangle of cloth.
It was a rank slide, and had a single crown at the bottom edge. A major’s crown, to replace the two pips of a lieutenant on the one still on his chest. He would never see the three pips of a captain – unless he was busted down again after all this was over. If there was anyone left alive to demote him.
“With your permission, sir?”
Jameson nodded, and Croucher undid the button on his chest, replaced the slide with the new one, and re-buttoned it. He then stood to attention. “In light of your field promotion during a time of war. Congratulations, Major.”
Then he snapped a sharp salute.
Jameson returned it. “Return to your duties,” he said.
Croucher turned to the formation. “One Troop – dis-MISS!”
The fifteen men – all of those, plus the three on the stairs, who were left of the original thirty-six Marines of One Troop – turned sharply to the right, saluted as one, and marched back outside. Half of them had come off the line for this. And the other half had given up their rest time. And fully half of them were gone.
Jameson stood and watched Croucher and Sledge follow them out. Looking down at the rank slide, he noticed it was slightly singed. At least there wasn’t blood on it. When all his men were out of sight and hearing, he turned back into a dark corner of the stairwell.
And he sobbed explosively, crying for nearly five minutes.
* * *
“And baby makes three,” Ali whispered into the dark, relieving another Zulu of its head as it stuck it over the top of the meat pile. This was the third dead guy to come sniffing around, and it was unlikely to be the last. And it was important to stop any that did – because some always drew more.
And as long as they kept their mouths shut, their falling bodies shouldn’t attract any attention from the migrating herd behind them. Ali’s weapon certainly didn’t make any noise. There would be the wet sound of the head disintegrating. But if the dead weren’t already used to the sound of meat coming apart, they were never going to be.
She definitely had her old job back now – pure sniping. In some ways, it felt a little below her pay grade, as she had most recently been running all of CentCom, and before that undertaking the mission to save the world. But no one else was stepping up for this one. And certainly no one was more qualified. Mainly, Ali wasn’t in the complaining business – no more about this job than her prior one.
Like everyone else, she did what needed doing.
And what they all needed to do now, mainly, was wait. While lying on her stomach and policing the perimeter, she’d quietly called around on the radio to get some updates, bypassing the JOC and the Colonel’s new regime there. So she was pretty wired into all corners, and knew where they stood.
By now, just about everyone under arms in CentCom had been vaccinated – the late-coming USOC force was getting theirs now – and the support staff were being cycled through, as well. Park and Aliyev were sitting in vigil waiting to observe the actual effects of MZ on the captured Foxtrot – while back in Bio, the MZ was culturing back up into a useable amount, and the vaccine itself being fabricated at high speed, and loaded into the millions of prefab vaccination kits. There might even soon be fuel for the plane to start air-dropping them – in a whispered confab from the JOC, Miller had suggested this, though there was something distinctly skeptical in his tone.
He had sounded more confident when she asked him how much time he thought London had – answering that both the city and its population were ready, much more prepared than every other major city had been at the time of the fall. But Ali wasn’t so sure. It seemed to her they had counted on the ZPW to save them, or at least give them time. But it had been breached in a couple of days, not weeks or months.
So she was pretty sure all those tasks underway across CentCom had really better happen sooner – because none of them were anything like guaranteed to see later.
But, then again, none of that was Ali’s responsibility now.
And she was fine with this, too. She also didn’t mind the solitude she was getting to enjoy. Baxter and Kate had taken themselves off the line for a while, and Ali had the sniper OP to herself. With all of CentCom blacked out and silent, and the imperial army of the dead leaving them alone for now, it was an oddly peaceful scene, and a quiet moment.
Even the rain had stopped, at least for a while.
But Ali didn’t imagine any of it was going to last – any more than she was going to get to keep the simple sniping job.
She knew this was just the calm before the storm.
And when that next storm came, it would be the last one – and perhaps the worst. All around CentCom, they were preparing for what was certain to be the endgame. And Ali knew it wasn’t just all the pieces for the endgame inside these walls. It was also everyone she loved – all of them left alive.
And that included Handon.
He was still lying in the med wing in an induced coma. And when the dead came over the walls, he wouldn’t even be able to defend himself. Next time, would there be anybody there to protect him? They sure couldn’t count on Sarah – couldn’t count on her to do anything but fuck up, and make trouble. Obviously, Ali would be happy to go down in a pile of her own brass, or lying on her own sword, before letting them get through to Handon. But that was only if her job didn’t get in the way – if her duty allowed it. Once again, there it was.
That conflict between duty and love.
For all she knew, she’d already lost Homer, to his duty.
Movement caught her eye – not on top of the meat wall this time, but out in the middle of no-man’s land. She swiveled and depressed her rifle and optic to target and track it.
It was Predator and Juice.
There could be no mistaking them – the bulk, and the beard.
Jesus, guys, what the hell…?
The two were scurrying across the open ground out beyond the walls but behind the meat wall, threading through piles of bodies, and making for the abandoned convoy – like two truant boys sneaking into a farmer’s orchard to steal apples.
She had no idea what the hell they were doing, but could only laugh – and also scan the ground to their front and sides, providing her traditional overwatch service. They didn’t really need it. But it made her feel good to protect her brothers.
And to have something else to think about.
Other than the coming storm.
Mentors
CentCom – CP Guard Tower
Wesley wasn’t quite so prone to introspection, or fretting about the larger picture, but he was alone, and certainly appreciated that the rain had stopped. Maybe it was a good sign. Right now his RMP senior NCOs were out walking the lines, or else resting, and he was alone in the CP with his tablet again.
Ever since being put in charge of the Naval Security Forces on the Kennedy, he’d found command seemed to involve more staring at screens than one would have guessed. He decided to take a break, putting the tablet down and taking himself out on the circular walkway outside, looking to the north.
While he faced toward London, which he couldn’t see but knew was falling in real time, his mind’s eye instead did actually look back a little. He remembered with amusement his insecurity from the early days, that feeling of being an imposter – of having been put in charge due to some incomprehensible error – and, moreover, having no idea what the hell he was doing. Maybe it was that there had been no choice, or no time, but all of that was behind him now.
Now he just got on with it.
Looking out at the faint glow of burning London, he tried not to think about what would happen if that horde overran them here. Then again, whatever happened, he knew he’d be able to face it – because he’d already been through the worst. At the time, he thought being chased by packs of runners, ahead of the storm of ten million dead in Virginia, was as bad as anything could get. But then there had been Jizan, with its biblical fire and flood… and, well, he knew nothing could ever rival that for sheer terror, peril, and general awfu
lness.
And he’d somehow survived that, completing that mission, retrieving the DNA sequencer, and even getting all of his people out – all but one, that is. Just as he’d gotten all but one of his team, plus the survivor group, out of Virginia… swept the lower decks of the JFK for dead… got his shore team launched off the carrier during the Spetsnaz attack… secured the hangar and repaired the plane… and even saved Alpha team itself in the Spetsnaz ambush on the tarmac – once again losing only a single man in the process.
That seemed to be a theme, come to notice it. Somebody always died. It was always just one person’s time.
No, wait – in his very first days on the Kennedy, before he was in charge of anything, he’d helped Fick and Martin secure the reactor control room, and keep the carrier from crashing into the coast – and nobody with them, as far as he could recall, had gotten killed on that one. A damned miracle, given how terrified and out of his depth he’d been back then.
So many missions, so much hard experience behind him. His brow wrinkled now as he suddenly considered that maybe all of that was why he no longer felt like an imposter. He’d never really had a moment to mentally review his whole accelerated military career. And it was hard to see the pyramid rising up beneath you, when you were always crushed under the next huge stone coming down.
Then again, Wesley was smart enough to know not to let his guard down, or take anything for granted. To understand that none of those accomplishments was any guarantee of success in the next job. And that, as his successes led to more responsibility, nothing was going to get any easier.
In fact, he felt sure it would all just keep getting harder.
Every time out.
He went back inside and got his face back in the tablet, underneath his improvised black-out curtain – he wasn’t going to risk even the light from the screen leaking out and attracting the dead. But less than a minute later he heard boots on the stairs. When he pulled the hood off, it was Fick, pouring himself a cup of coffee from the jug on the desk.
“Want one?” he asked, his back turned.
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