“Cool. Dan?” Dan simply nodded.
“I’ll brief my squads. We’ll be ready in five.”
***
They passed two large groups of survivors on the intersections, each over a hundred strong. They didn’t stop the buses, despite some of the figures trying to wave them down. The MP’s keyed their radios and tried to raise comms with the police they could see, telling them to move everyone to the Vandenberg loop road. Other groups, between a couple to a few dozen strong, were also seen, but they seemed to be harassed by a small number of aggressive shapes who lurked around the shadows around them. “Strength in numbers,” muttered someone near Dan. While the large, main streets looked clear, they saw a number of bloodied bodies down the side streets. Despite the warm sun, the chill of horror at the situation they now faced weighed heavily on them all. There wasn’t any talking on the bus ride in.
At the intersection the two buses stopped alongside each other and the soldiers shook out, with the Rangers spacing themselves out in the centre. Dan’s squad commanders could only communicate with him via link-men and hand signals, and he’d given pretty strict instructions to keep everything spaced tightly together and close. They weren’t in danger from enemy gunfire, so there was no need to keep them spaced out and dispersed. Instead they would move as a tight group, maximizing mutual support between each soldier and ensuring no-one could get isolated.
Dan’s northern-most squad to his left cleared up to their starting point 400 meters away while his right squad held their position just beyond the buses. Once they were both in position he was going to wave his hand and they would step off together, clearing both north and south streets of the loop-road, staying parallel to each other. The Rangers moved between the two squads in a more relaxed, open formation, but Dan ignored them for now. They could handle themselves, and he needed to focus all his attention on keeping the squads in line. Lance was within sight of Dan and, once he saw his left-hand squad had arrived at their starting point, he looked in to the Ranger. Lance nodded curtly, and Dan waved his hand forward, above his head. The two squads stepped off. Behind him he could hear the buses easing of their brakes and start to slowly roll forwards behind them.
They had only moved around twenty meters on their axis of advance when a few shots rang out from the left-hand squad. Dan resisted the urge to run up and see what was happening and was pleased to see that there wasn’t any pausing. The slow and steady pace continued. A few more shots followed from the same left-hand squad, before a steady rate of a shot every ten or so seconds kicked off across the entire frontage of the group. The Rangers seemed to be doing most of the firing, Dan realized after they had covered 500 meters, most likely because they were clearing around buildings and cars. Their firing was different – quieter and harder to pinpoint. They must be rocking suppressed weapons.
Dan tried to remain central between his squads, but he had to detour to the South as he moved around a large office building complex. The Rangers in front of him had to start running to clear around the buildings while remaining in line with Dan’s squads. They moved with purpose, their rifles raised to their shoulders throughout, making only the briefest pause at each corner before two of the swung around it, one high and one low. Shots continued to echo irregularly around Dan as they continued to sweep towards the large Headquarters complex to their front. Dan took a moment to check behind him, and he could see his depth squad alongside the two buses that continued to roll slowly forwards.
As he turned back to the direction of advance he scanned the side of the office building he was moving past, maybe 30 meters away. The Rangers had moved forward, and the sporadic single or double-tap of small arms fire could be heard from the far side of the building. As Dan moved over a wide concrete walkway that linked the building to a parking lot straddling the road to his right he turned and looked into the double doors of the building. They were open, and in that instance he saw four figures come running out at a steady pace, low to the ground. Their gait was unnatural and he saw red, rust-like marks on the face and hands of the first figure to enter the sunlight. Dan was startled but he had instinctively orientated onto them, his feet apart, facing the figures with his M4 raised and his safety off. He could almost hear the instructor’s commands inside his head. Feet apart, bend the knees slightly, controlled breathing. Targets to your front, safety off, watch and shoot!
The first two figures saw Dan and froze while the two behind them continued to run. Dan stared down his barrel as his heart pounded and adrenaline pumped into his body, but he kept his breathing steady as he felt the world around him narrow in to the space between him and his target and felt time begin to slow down. He had the first figure lined up in his iron sights and he paused, waiting until the crouched face distorted into a grimace and let loose a low-pitched whine. Steady breath in, steady breath out. That was all the prompting Dan needed – he softly tapped his trigger twice in close succession, in between his breaths as his iron sights steadied on his target. The muzzle exploded in front of him as the two bullets punched out of the barrel at supersonic speeds. The first round smashed its way into the crouched figure’s chest and the second caught the figure’s right shoulder immediately afterwards. A small arc of blood sprayed from the second hit and the figure crumpled to the ground. 5.56mm bullets were sharp, fast projectiles designed to take down a Russian soldier wearing body armor. They were like a nail hammered home at phenomenal speed, doing little in the way of an entry wound as they punched into an unprotected body but capable of spinning and smashing apart all manner of internal organs, bones and generally destroying a body in its wake as it transferred its energy into the target. On the same account it could also punch straight through a human body, leaving little more than a tidy entry and exit wound if it was a poorly aimed shot or if the bullet didn’t connect with anything solid while passing through. It all came down to aiming, with follow-up shots or double-tap engagements helping raise the probability of a kill. A kill, against... these. Despite having served a tour in Afghanistan this was the first time Dan had ever used his rifle in anger and he felt shaken. His ears were ringing and his head was spinning from the noise of his rifle firing, adding to his discomfort. It wasn’t right, he thought, I’ve never trained to shoot at anything unarmed.
The two running shapes had vanished out of sight, spurred on by the gunshots, but the second figure remained frozen as it stared at Dan. It stood in direct sunlight, clearly framed in front of the dark building, and Dan could make out a lot more detail on it than he could on the first. Despite the bloodied face and deep rust-red hemorrhaging that had been smeared around the nose, ears and mouth the facial features were still, underneath the gore, human. Although he couldn’t see the eyes clearly over the 30 meters Dan was sure there was an inhuman, glazed appearance. The lips were drawn back in a permanent snarl showing red, bloodied teeth and the head moved in an unnatural, jerking manner while the creature’s entire body rocked forward and back on his rear haunches. Despite the bloodied shirt Dan could easily recognize the working uniform of a male air force officer. Shit, shit, shit. Unlike before, this was almost personal. Only a matter of seconds had passed by but it felt like a long time to Dan, who was able to register and study the target in front of him in detail. The figure seemed to be equal parts enraged by Dan’s presence and equal parts terrified by the noise of gunfire and remained in place, jerkily rocking back and forth low to the ground, like it was waiting for a prompt to either attack or flee. Dan remembered the rules of engagement Lance had set, but he paused another second. The figure broke out of its reverie and half-lurched back into the door-way.
The movement was all the incentive Dan needed and he snapped back into action. He didn’t want to have to face this thing again, especially if it was inside a narrow corridor. He also didn’t want to leave it for someone else to encounter. Holding the trigger back, Dan fired a short automatic burst, keeping the initial aiming point low and to the left. The first few 5.56 rounds spun the figure ar
ound and the next few rounds pummeled the figure’s mid-section and chest with sickening thumps. Small geysers of blood erupted in multiple directions before the final rounds of the burst smashed into the figure’s skull in a light red mist as it collapsed onto the ground. Dan stared through the foresight of his M4, still trained on the collapsed figures, shaking slightly in his hands. Keep breathing. In, and out. In, and out.
Some gunfire erupted from over his shoulder as the other two running figures collided with the rear squad escorting the buses. Dan stepped back from the scene and made a mental effort to refocus back onto the direction of the advance. The sweep ahead of him had pushed ahead and was almost out of sight; Dan had to run to close the distance and regain his position. There was some shouting mixed in with gunfire to his front, and as he made his way through a large car-park, stepping over a bloodied body, he realized that they were near the objective. The three storied headquarters building loomed directly ahead. His mind shut out the image of the dead, inhuman ghouls he had just shot and he focused on the mission ahead of him.
***
It took longer than he would have thought necessary to confirm that they had cleared up to the end of the ring road and to order his forward squads to start moving into the headquarters building and the car-park. The chaos and adrenaline of the sweep had shaken most of the soldiers, Dan included, and even the simplest task of passing a message on seemed to take on epic proportions. Dan eventually moved to both squad leaders on the left and right in person to ensure they were pulling their men back in and forming a proper perimeter. The Rangers secured the inside of the cordon, keeping their weapons trained on the building, and prepared to make entry.
Some people had climbed out of the windows once the squads had shown up and were assembling by their buses, huddling in their shade. A few armed guards had appeared at the front of the building and were happy to see the Rangers outside, but the news wasn’t good. The corridors were effectively no-man’s land, and it seemed that everyone had barricaded themselves inside their rooms. Shouting and screams had been heard by those inside for the first few hours after the sick started to turn, but according to those who came out an eerie silence had fallen over the building – and indeed the entire base – since then. The guards themselves were more military police who had been manning the front of the building when it went down and had tried to make their way to the Tactical Operations Centre, or TOC, shortly after the attacks began. They only had pistols on them and had only made it through a single wing before they were almost out of ammunition, forced to retreat back to their position by the front door.
The MP Sergeant was busy on his radio, trying to relay their plans to those inside the TOC. While they were uncertain and confused on the outside, it sounded like there was even less knowledge of what was going on and even more panic on the inside. The TOC, far from being the central nervous centre and the functioning mind of the base, had become paralyzed and isolated.
“I don’t know what support we’re going to find when we get there,” Lance mentioned quietly to Dan, “but I think that we’ll be getting access to radio equipment and some pretty confused or panicked headquarters types.”
“It’s a start at least,” Dan replied.
The plan was quick and dirty. Three stories; a four-man Ranger fire-team on each level each supported by one of Dan’s squads. They were going in noisy, broadcasting their intent to try and get all those who were healthy and had barricaded inside to open up and assemble outside. The MP’s would secure the outside area as well as shepherding those inside the building out to the safe area. Dan and Lance were going to follow the ground floor team so they could get to the TOC and find out what was going on in Peterson Base.
If the horror of coming across the aggressive, turned figures outside was bad, it was an order of magnitude worse inside. Not only did they encounter the hunched, snarling and bloodied faces at closer quarters, each time they came across one they triggered its fight or flight response. This was Close Quarters Combat in its purest form.
Clearing the corridors was an easy enough task as they could shoot down it with impunity. The rooms themselves were a different matter. While sometimes they were lucky – more often than not, as it turned out, for at least half of those inside were normal, healthy but scared people hiding and waiting for help – the handful of the unnatural, beast-like beings they did encounter made it a living nightmare. Every aggressive figure found was more than a terrifying visage in their own right. Almost inevitably they were found with a horrifying and grizzly scene of death and murder around them.
None of the meek or scared figures were located; they had all fallen to the brutality and violence of the aggressive ones. It was hard shooting a human-like figure when you couldn’t reach through to him with your voice; it was harder still looking in the room and seeing that they had already taken, in the most brutal and animalistic way possible, the lives of the other, more reticent and panicked creatures.
It took less than 40 minutes for the lower-floor squad to fight their way to the end of the west wing. The Ranger fire-team had initially been the ones to clear the rooms while the squad kept close watch on the corridor, but the fatigue and the sheer number of rooms meant that everyone was making entry after the first few blocks. It was hard going, hot and draining. Walking behind the squad Dan could already hear the amplified buzz of flies in the hot Colorado heat. While sweat prickled under his collar his skin continued to crawl and shiver in revulsion and shock at what was going on.
“We’re here,” called back one of the soldiers. Dan and Lance moved forward and saw a sign that indicated they were at the Peterson Air Force Base Tactical Operations Centre.
The doors to the large room were now open, and a few men and women in air force dress uniforms were standing at the doorway. They were unarmed, Dan saw, but one clearly had a fire extinguisher close to hand. While the majority of the squad and the Rangers returned to sweep down the rest of the corridor, leaving only two soldiers as security outside the TOC, Dan and Lance stepped into the room. Large screens were still on and functioning. A good sign. There were a number of blood stains next to seats and smeared on the floor. When he looked back at the fire extinguisher he realized that it was dented and there was blood smeared along its round body. He didn’t need to ask; he could picture what had happened here.
A dozen men and women sat at various stations around the room. Their eyes were wide and their skin pale – more signs of delayed shock – but they all made their best effort to man the comms stations that sparked up occasionally with static and hissed and garbled messages.
“Who’s in charge here?” Lance asked.
The woman at the door hesitated then shrugged. “I’m holding the place down, I guess,” she said. “The operations officer and most of his staff left when they heard some shouting after... after it started. We’d dragged the sick out of here so we could be free to co-ordinate the medical response, but after the screaming and yelling outside we started to shut the doors. One or two of... them... made it in here but we still managed to lock the doors... We haven’t heard from the Ops officer since, and we’ve been trying to raise the base commander. We knew you were coming and we were kind of, waiting, I guess, for you to show up.” Lance nodded.
Dan asked the man with the fire extinguisher what happened to his arm. It was tightly wrapped in an improvised bandage from someone’s dress shirt, but he could see a bloody stain soaking through the thin fabric.
“One of them came sprinting in here, before we locked the door. I cornered it in the back after it lunged at Melissa,” he nodded to one of the women manning a radio console “and ended up in a bit of a struggle. It bit and scratched me before I got its head jammed under one of the seats and managed to kill the thing.”
Dan studied his arm closely. “How long ago?”
“That was a few hours back. I wasn’t the only one – another guy also got cut up in a struggle.” Dan looked around. No-one else was wearing a bandage.<
br />
“He went down afterwards, pretty quickly. Standard loss of vital signs, breathing difficulties, some thrashing and onset of convulsions, pretty bad bleeding from the face. We’d learnt though and we put him down the corridor further. The doors stayed locked after that.”
“But you’re fine?”
“Yeah. I guess, lucky maybe. I had everyone promise me they would toss me out the moment I started losing consciousness but so far I’ve been OK. Well, my arm’s screaming like hell and my head’s throbbing from a knock I took during the struggle but, all things considered, I reckon I’m one of the fortunate ones.”
“So what’s the status of the base?” Lance asked, turning back to the centre of the room. The women who had first met them at the door looked warily over the rows of computer stations, most of the seats which were empty.
“We’re tracking some call-signs, mainly military police, on the base’s RT net. We’ve also got traffic cameras feeding video into here and we started to make some phone calls to a few other buildings, but our picture is patchy. Most survivors are congregating at the large intersections and we had a couple of MP hummers escorting them to a cleared hangar next to the Colorado Springs airport terminal, which is on base. There are only thirty or so MP’s but they are doing some stellar work. A few police tried to uplift some water and rations for the assembly area from the chow-hall but found it too risky inside, so that fell over. Another MP call-sign is on watch at the front gate, ready to hold and direct any civilians who come in to our hangar area. So far nothing, though, and no traffic is going past the base either – apparently the highway is blocked in some pretty big pile-ups at various points so it’s impossible to get anyway on wheels. The control tower was functioning until an hour ago, and we haven’t been able to raise them since. The housing area is...wild right now, according to the one MP pair that tried to patrol the area. That’s pretty much the state of things.” Dan grimaced. The housing area. That would be where the kids and families of those who were working on base were surviving... or dying.
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