The Decline

by Jessulat, Christopher

  An alarm.

  ***

  Sullivan and the other gunner froze in place.

  A wisp of smoke curled from the cigarette in the gunner’s mouth, twisted obscenely from the sudden interruption in his draw.

  ‘What the fuck is that?’ Sullivan cursed as he came to his feet.

  The sound was coming a few blocks away, back the way they came.

  And it was blaring.

  ‘Jesus Christ, is that a car alarm?’

  The two stared incredulously at each other. Neither had heard a car horn in weeks.

  Now was not the time to appreciate the nostalgia.

  ‘We need to go,’ the other gunner spat as he abruptly threw the cigarette down. The cherry flared as it struck the stained boards and sent bits of embers dancing along the floor.

  Sullivan nodded his agreement and the two grabbed their gear before rushing back down the stairs to the main level. Their heavy boots and hurried strides thudded on the hardwood and reverberated throughout the abandoned building; they cared little for the racket they made.

  Speed was of the essence now.

  The alarm continued to wail down the street.

  They came to the entrance they had breached and Sullivan peered out the doorway. He couldn’t see any movement in the streets, and he couldn’t see anyone from the salvage team.

  ‘Stay here and keep a close eye,’ Sully ordered his companion. ‘I’ve got the streets the way we came; I need you to keep your sights trained on the opposite side of the complex. If there is anything over there, it’ll be heading this way.’

  The young gunner nodded solemnly and fell into a prone position, fixated on the far corner of the building.

  He looked composed; Sullivan felt the confidence in his colleague surge.

  Sullivan sprinted from the entranceway and skidded down behind the ruined truck in the courtyard. He shouldered the SKS and scanned the streets from where they came.

  The sound was a block or more away, but it would draw a crowd.

  They couldn’t stay here.

  ***

  Anders had turned to signal the other nests. Ever since Quinn had confiscated the two-way radios, the teams relied on basic hand signals to communicate with each other over distances.

  He felt foolish as he admitted the approximate count; the repetition forced him to articulate his ineptitude.

  Over the next several minutes as the information was circulated below, the complex transformed into a beehive of activity. Soldiers took position and lined up along the wall, their regular patrol routes abandoned to shore up the southern fencing.

  Only the constructed shooting platform had a line of sight that would accommodate firing in this direction, albeit from an extra thirty yards. The nest on top of the command module wouldn’t be able to get a bead around the living quarters.

  Soldiers were in short supply, even moreso skilled shooters at range. The sniper that was in the command nest came up to join Anders and the grunt; if they needed to thin the crowd he rationalized they’d be better off with two from this vantage point. He brought with him a mostly full box of .338 Lapua Magnum. Taking a position next to the other grunt, he spoke –

  ‘How did you manage to let that many bunch up on our doorstep?’

  The grunt Anders was vaguely familiar with briefly took his eye from his scope to address the other soldier. He twitched his head and quickly shot a piercing glare back at Anders.

  ‘That fucking tool.’

  Anders again wanted to protest the accusation on the grounds that the grunt was asleep, but kept his mouth shut.

  It wasn’t a particularly compelling argument.

  The new sniper rolled his eyes in contempt and shifted in his seat as he searched for a comfortable firing position.

  ‘Who’s covering the middle approach?’ Anders asked, trying to regain some modicum of respect.

  Neither soldier turned to look at Anders.

  ‘We need to deal with the problems we know about, first,’ the new sniper stated flatly. ‘Besides, we have a decent line on the main drag from here, in the event we need to redeploy.’

  Anders didn’t like dividing resources like this; he was deeply unsettled with the knowledge the command nest wasn’t properly manned.

  And it was his fault.

  Of course, he realized not only that it wasn’t his call – but also that nobody present cared about his opinion anyway.

  The two snipers practiced cycling through the crowd of infected, grimly rehearsing their pecking order.

  Anders stammered to find something meaningful to say, but only stumbled over himself.

  He sagged down into his seat and almost lost the will to breathe. He felt it best to sit in downtrodden silence, lest he screw up again and further compound his miseries.

  Anders sulked in this new isolation, a biting loneliness gnawed at his innards as his memory turned to home and his people there. It didn’t matter if across the Atlantic was faring any better; he’d likely never see the familiar shores of Finland again. He’d never see his parents, his sister, or his friends… assuming any of them were still alive.

  He wanted to slink off and crawl into a hole.

  Anders rolled his head back on his shoulders and he stared into the sky. Closing his eyes for a moment, he allowed himself a brief fantasy that none of this had come to pass. The breeze was brisk and it had stirred the surf; the sound of the waves as they thirstily lapped against the pier transported him back to the cold harbours of Kotka, his hometown.

  The illusion was almost complete when his eyes shot open.

  He sat up immediately and noted his present company heard it, too.

  A siren of some kind; car horns.

  The two soldiers exchanged a somber look. The sound was coming from somewhere off behind them, it bounced between the buildings and through the inescapable wastes.

  Anders leapt from his seat and instinctively raised the binoculars, trained them southwards at the congregation of the dead.

  Shit…

  They heard it, too.

  Chapter 9

  Cox kicked everyone into gear.

  ‘Let’s go, we’re out of here.’

  Recognizing he didn’t have time for the dignity he meant to afford the soldier, Isaac bounded over to the dead man and threw the towel over his shattered form.

  Cox led them back down the staircase and they slammed through the doors. The rest of the team had regrouped in the foyer and anxiously awaited Cox’s return. In the relative silence of the lobby, the sound of the wailing car alarm was more pronounced as it filtered through the bullet holes and missing windows that peppered the hospital’s ground floor.

  But there were other sounds announcing their presence amongst the darkened hallways.

  The hammering of fists and limbs as they pounded at distant doors and barricades.

  The hoarse rasping of dried lungs as they stirred from an unnatural slumber.

  The shambling march of an army of teeth.

  The narrow beams of tactical flashlights punctuated their nervousness as they darted about the adjacent corridors, their rays hungering for the silhouettes of movement.

  Cox and her small group came into the centre of the foyer as two riflemen maintained overwatch at the hallway. They madly scanned the corridors.

  ‘We got what we came for, we’re leaving,’ Cox offered and motioned to the window where they came in, ‘Porters first.’

  The porters threw their packs out the window and the burly one climbed out first, then helped the other two. The fire team was lining up for extraction when one of the guards at the entry opened fire.

  The report was deafening inside the structure.

  The second rifleman wheeled to face the direction of his colleague and he snapped off a round into the approaching storm.r />
  Both had bolt action rifles; they cycled the actions one more time before firing again into the advancing fray.

  Cox called out, ‘Fuck them; let’s go!’

  Isaac was next out the window and passed the Remington through the opening. The burly man and another runner grabbed his arms and heaved him up. The strain on his shoulder was intense, but worse still were his ribs being drawn over the window frame. Isaac swooned and his vision darkened as he crashed unceremoniously to the snow. He started to scramble to his hands and knees when he was grabbed by the collar and hauled to his feet.

  Isaac had found his senses again; he realized how much he had missed the feel of sunshine.

  The gunner stationed opposite the central hub opened fire with his semi auto, but none of the fire team could tell the direction or the intent of the shots.

  They definitely recognized the thunder of the SKS, though.

  Still inside the foyer, Cox crouched down and brought the scope to her eye.

  As the two riflemen fell back from the hallway entrance toward the window’s lifeline, she squeezed a few rounds into the advancing ghouls. She was utterly disheartened to find her aim was off – the rounds didn’t fall anywhere near her intended mark.

  The earlier melee must have dislodged the scope.

  She cursed under her breath and hurried the others on.

  The jumble of dead advanced steadily, but hadn’t yet made it to the foyer entrance.

  Cox slung the C7 over her shoulder and bolted for the window, easily reaching it ahead of the other two.

  The burly man caught her outstretched hand and effortlessly hauled her slender frame through the window, his natural strength exponentially supplemented by the fires of adrenaline.

  Sullivan glanced over his shoulder and saw most of the team was out of the hospital now. As badly as he wanted to rush over and rejoin the group, he kept his post and surveyed the streets on his end. He knew his colleague had rattled off a few rounds and suspected the troupe would need to head his way for the run home; he would do his duty.

  That damned wailing continued.

  Cox found her footing and turned to help the next rifleman out of the window. She couldn’t see the swarming dead inside but guessed they had to be close now. She reached in and found his frantic hands.

  As they hoisted him out, the panicked expression on the man’s face said it all. His feet kicked fervently as he tried to propel himself to the salvation of the open air.

  The burly man brusquely threw this one aside and started back to reach for their last mate when the screams poured from within. He bent to glance through the window to the foyer but only witnessed a sea of hands and faces, a great clutching wave of hungry corpses as it broke against the hospital walls and smothered the unfortunate man trapped inside.

  Even if it weren’t for the horrible screams, there was no doubt he was lost. The burly porter stepped back from the window and swallowed involuntarily.

  More shots rang out from across the courtyard.

  Things were getting dodgy.

  ‘Get your shit; we need to go, now!’

  The porters collected their gear and everyone fell in. Cox spotted Sullivan by the truck, positioned to face their original approach and guessed the other gunner fired at the opposite side of the building. They collapsed back to Sully and shouted for the other gunman to converge on their position.

  The alarm continued to scream down the road.

  The SKS gunner was the last to hook up with the unit. He crashed over to the group.

  ‘We just made a pile of friends,’ he blurted sarcastically as he fiddled with a fresh clip. ‘There’s more coming from that side.’

  Cox had a general sense the alarm blared from near the top of the hill where they had stopped and scanned the streets below around Harbour Station. By this time, no doubt the majority of the infected she counted about the entrance had crested that hill.

  ‘What set that off?’ one of the porters asked.

  ‘We must have riled them up pretty bad, maybe one broke a window from inside the car it was trapped in?’ another suggested.

  ‘Doesn’t fucking matter,’ Isaac retorted. He stared at the ground. His ribs ached.

  Cox agreed. Maybe it would have been prudent to clear some of the cars, but retrospect was worthless.

  They couldn’t go back the way they came, and they couldn’t go around the hospital.

  They’d need to find an alternate route.

  Sullivan chimed in. ‘Look, we gotta go – I don’t care where, but we can’t sit here. These streets are going to be swarming with corpses soon.’

  A pair of ghouls wandered into view from the other side of the parking lot, irrevocably drawn towards that blasted horn. The SKS gunner rose and shouldered his rifle when Cox grabbed his pant leg.

  ‘Save the rounds,’ she commanded.

  ‘We’re going to need them.’

  ***

  As if they responded to a single consciousness, the ghouls staggered forward in blind pursuit of that damned alarm.

  Somewhere in the distance, Anders thought he could hear traces of sporadic gunfire.

  ‘Look alive,’ jeered the original grunt, who managed a grin at his clever wordplay. ‘We’re about to be busy.’

  Anders didn’t even have a weapon; his impotence astounded him.

  Both the snipers focused through their apertures and chattered about their preferred targets as the wall of dead approached the compound. They settled on their plan of engagement and set a landmark to begin firing.

  Anders raised his binoculars.

  The storm over the Bay was closing fast, stretching to envelop the southern tip of the peninsula.

  The earnest horde wallowed forth in its thoughtless hunger.

  ‘Here we go…’

  As the dead reached the appointed place along the street, the Timberwolves cracked to life. The .338 Lapua Mag were devastating rounds – a hit most anywhere on the withered corpses would fragment their ruined bodies and cause them to burst. The report roared from the muzzles and echoed through the wasteland; Anders covered his ears for the discomfort.

  The snipers set about their work with grim precision. The C14’s were bolt action, but neither shooter needed more than one round per target. Neither fired with unnecessary haste, and each only fired when wholly satisfied with their bead. The dead were mindless and moved in an almost straight line – there was no need to rush their shots.

  Anders had to admit, despite the predisposition to sleeping on the job, his nameless partner was operating with near mechanical efficiency.

  The crowd of advancing dead was thinning fast, the snow covered road stained with their blight as they were cut down in their tracks.

  Both snipers dropped their spent mags, clicked new ones in and cycled their actions.

  Capitalizing on a chance to redeem himself, Anders collected the two discarded magazines. He tipped the box of .338 into his hands and loaded the clips again, ready to swap them out for spent ones.

  Anders counted their bullets. Based on his initial estimate of the ghouls congregated in the street, Anders figured they’d have just about the perfect amount to wrap up; maybe even a couple rounds to spare.

  The rifles continued their deafening anthem.

  ***

  Andrew could hear the shots split the air outside the command centre.

  He had been working on the radio at a furious pace in a vain attempt to raise whatever had interrupted the static before. His frustrations mounted. He fiddled with the knobs in the futile hope of improving the signal clarity. His voice cracked as he forsook the script altogether and freewheeled whatever pleas for assistance came to mind.

  Nothing but the droning, inescapable static.

  He wanted to smash the radio for its taunt, scream into the receiver.
/>   The shots outside continued to echo throughout the complex.

  Desperate, Andrew called for Quinn, all thoughts of subversion abandoned.

  Quinn burst into the room.

  ‘I… I just heard something, someone maybe,’ Andrew bleated. ‘Something interrupted the static.’

  Quinn’s eyes widened and he rushed over to stand near Andrew’s chair.

  ‘What did it say?’

  ‘Nothing, really…’ Andrew stuttered, who now felt very foolish at his hysteria. ‘Something clicked, like someone was trying to respond to my signal. Or someone picked us up. Squelch, maybe?’

  It wasn’t much to go off of, but it was the most success they had enjoyed yet from the radio.

  Several more shots pounded outside; fear was written all over Andrew’s face. Quinn could see Andrew struggled for something else to say.

  Quinn didn’t have time to coddle the boy.

  ‘Get them back,’ he reiterated, turning back for the door. ‘That’s an order.’

  ***

  Cox and her team sprinted down the only other street open to them, away from the hospital and on the other side of the Y intersection they had taken to the ruined courtyard. Buildings lined the street on either side and offered some cover as they ran.

  ‘That fucking alarm has got to shut off at some point,’ one of the porters wheezed as he struggled to keep up.

  They meant to break left at the first intersection, dart away from the cacophony of the blaring horn, and then cut down through some of the mixed residential streets until they were more or less due east of the Coast Guard site. From there, they’d come out along the main drag and be within sight of the shooting platform.

  Further down the street the group could see silhouettes of the shambling dead, thankfully oblivious to their presence as they sought only to converge on the source of the alarm. Cox motioned them all to hug up against the corner of a large, beige brick building behind her, where she leaned out and inspected their proposed route.

  In their quest for the blaring horn, several of the reanimated creatures were climbing the hill towards their present position.

  They would need to fight their way through.