Five minutes passed as Howser laid there, sighting in on the targets and preparing himself to hit them fast and in an order he’d created in importance of rank. He gave a wry smile and put the reticle on the Captain’s forward head and waited for the SAW to open up. That was to be their signal. He had already scoped out both positions of his fellow Delta brothers and knew they were in position. The whoomps of the mortars firing were interrupted with a staccato of rounds being fired off to his right. This was the signal he’d been waiting for. He let out half of the breath he had been holding, just like his daddy had taught him when he was eight and then was reinforced by the Master Sergeant who had refined his technique when he was just nineteen. He squeezed his trigger and watched the man’s head blast apart throwing brains, tissue, and bits of bone in the air. Before the man could fall to the ground Howser had already moved on to his next target.
When Harry heard the SAW fire, he had also scoped his targets and had also ordered them in importance. He used the same method that Howser had learned and fired at almost the same time as Howser’s first shot. Instead of taking a head shot though, he went for his target’s chest, knowing that the 7.62 round he was using could defeat almost all forms of personal armor, and watched as the man’s heart exploded out of his back. He didn’t wait to watch the rest of the man’s dying moments and instead, moved on to his next targets.
Hunter, loved his SAW and had been humping it with him since day one that had signaled the beginning of the end as the dead rose and set upon devouring the living. He had endured as Hase and the rest of the guys had poked fun at him for having such a useless weapon against the dead. But he knew someday it would be needed, and he wanted to make sure he had it when that time came. This gun was not very accurate, but that was not what it was designed for. It was made to pour out as many rounds as possible at an enemy’s position, and put the fear of God into them. In most men’s hands, the gun would be used for suppressive fire, but in Hunter’s hands, it became a weapon of mass death. He prided himself with the ability to hit his targets and leave devastation in his wake. He had sighted in on the team just off to his left who were in the action of reloading. They never had the chance to finish though, as the steel jacket rounds blew their bodies apart and kicked up puffs of dirt as they continued into the ground after exiting the men. Hunter smiled over his first hits, shifted his aim, and opened hell on any man in his sight. He was so good with the SAW that he was hitting his targets and was still able to create havoc among the Ridder forces at the rear of the convoy. Once his area was cleared of targets, he crawled out of his position and moved quickly to the rallying point, Harry had discussed with him. He felt assured that the enemy would think he was still in his position and would waste time trying to pin him down, as he relocated and hit them from another direction. This was why he’d joined Delta, to do what no other man or woman could do. To rain down death and fight for his country and brothers.
Howser, had just fired his last shot when the SAW went quiet. He watched his target collapse onto the dirt and then shifted his sights over to Hunter’s positon, just in time to watch him extricate, and start moving to the rally point. Howser dropped his head down and belly crawled backwards and down into a small ditch before sliding his MK16 Mod 0 SCAR light sniper rifle behind him, onto his back and brought his trusty HK 416 battle rifle around to his front, so he could use it on any targets of opportunity. He knew for a fact Harry would be doing the same thing, since they were the designated snipers of their team. They had done this sort of thing many times together and could read each other’s minds at will. Howser moved quickly along the ridge of the mountain, making sure to keep himself just on the other side of the slope to keep from being seen and shot at it. Another thing his daddy, who had been a Marine sniper during Vietnam, had taught him. Before he’d even joined the Army Howser had already been better than the majority of snipers employed by the military in many of their elite forces. Howser was tough, a great shot, but most importantly, he was smart beyond belief. His dad wouldn’t let him shoot until he finished all of his school work and had studied the advanced math that his dad showed him and military history. His dad was fond of always saying “Boy, who cares if you can shoot a flea’s balls off at five hundred yards, if you don’t know where his friends are or what tactics they would use to kill you? Learn what other men have had to learn on the battle-field, embrace it, and use it to kill the enemy, and come home alive.” Howser, during his career could be found listening to the veterans and senior men, hanging on to every word and absorbing their lessons. It was why he made an excellent teacher and leader, he was always ready with an exact plan and knew what the enemy would do before they did it.
Hunter caught up to Howser and they covered each other as they came around to the other side of the mountain and found Harry setting up his position already. They moved past and took up new positions far away from each other so as not to give the enemy a chance to take them all out at the same time. It took them no time at all to set up and sight in on their new targets. Hunter again started off the action by firing first. This time, he concentrated his firing on the antennas of the lead command APC. Harry and Howser concentrated on the officers and other Ridder soldiers as they scurried around, trying to find positions to fight back from.
A whooshing sound came from Howser’s left and he dropped his head into the dirt, knowing someone had just fired a rocket in his direction. He was pissed and once he felt the heat from the explosion just behind and to his right, he raised his head and sighted in on a man who hurriedly tried to reload. He never had a chance. Howser placed a round into his belly and then another into his left shoulder, taking him efficiently out of the action, and he was assured out of life also.
Harry, saw the man fire his rocket but never had a chance to fire on him or warn Howser, since he was busy himself, dodging concentrated fire from down below. He felt the explosion from the rocket and risked trying to sight in on the man who had fired the rocket, only to watch as Howser’s rounds found their mark. Harry smiled and had a second to check on Hunter’s situation. Hunter had already moved and repositioned further down the ridge and was now lighting someone up that Harry could not see from his position. He swung his scope around and blanched as he saw a Humvee with an M 240 come around and position to fire on them. He knew what he had to do and without a thought for his own safety moved to his knee, bringing his body higher so that he would draw their fire, giving Howser and Hunter a chance to reposition and live. Harry never cared for his personal safety and only cared for his brothers in his team. He was the “mother” on their team. He was always making sure they had the supplies that they needed, made sure they fed themselves, and was first to always accept the most dangerous jobs so they would never have to. He’d never really had a family. He’d grown up in a series of foster homes and had been abused and treated as a slave. He had never felt real love till he’d joined Delta and had met these men. He would never hesitate to sacrifice whatever he needed to for them. So when he presented himself as a target, it was truly without thought for his own safety. It was done all for love of his brothers.
The soldier manning the M 240 opened up on the hill and then caught sight of Harry, and directed his murderous fire onto his position. Harry fired back the same instant, and for being under direct fire, he was able to hit the soldier twice in the shoulder, but not before being hit several times himself in the chest and stomach. He refused to fall though and even though he knew he was dying he kept up his rate of fire, selecting targets and firing on them to cause mass chaos as his two team-mates moved from the area and enemy fire.
Hunter caught what was happening and felt an anger he had never known. He shifted his fire and opened up on the soldiers trying to move up the slope toward the wounded Harry. The SAW in his hands took scores of men down before he ran out of rounds. It took him a moment to realize this. He dropped his beloved weapon and brought his own HK 416 around on its sling and prepared to move to Harry’s position wh
en about ten men had moved up into it and were now on top of him.
Harry knew he was going to die, but that was okay. He had done what he’d always known he was born for. He had given his life for people that he cared for. He tried to breathe in a fresh breath of air, but choked on the rapidly pooling blood in his chest. He spat as much of the blood as he could onto the ground, but most dribbled down his armored chest and onto his lap. He heard the SAW’s thunderous roar and then subsequent quietness and knew he was about to have visitors. He looked down at his pouches and smiled. He had three grenades and knew what he was going to do. He pulled them into his hands and struggled to find the strength to pull the pins, after a moment that felt like a life-time, he succeeded. He made sure to keep his hands squeezed on the spoons and sat, waiting to deliver his little surprise. He heard them before he saw them. They made a lot of noise, unlike his team, who could be ghosts when they needed to be. As the troops came down on him he used his last bit of strength and raised his head in defiance. They looked pleased with themselves all the way to the point when Harry opened his hands, dropping the three grenades onto the ground around their feet.
“Go fuck yourselves!” he uttered through the blood with his last remaining breath.
The explosions were much bigger than what you see in movies and tore through them all, blowing body parts and shrapnel in all directions. Howser had not seen Harry go down under the fire from the M 240, but when Hunter’s fire had shifted to Harry’s position, he’d risked a moment to look. He saw the men and was prepared to go for Harry but then the area around Harry’s position exploded in a red mist as the grenades did their job. Howser breathed in deep and felt the loss of his brother. But instead of losing his shit, he turned and increased his rate of fire down the hill. Just then, the command APC exploded in a thunderous ball of fire. He traced the quickly dissipating smoke trail back to its source and knew the ATMs had just entered the fight. More vehicles started disappearing as they exploded from ATM fire. He felt like they could actually win this battle.
Chapter 7
Hase, Helmut, and Heaven repositioned themselves to follow the Ridder forces as they moved toward the garage door on their side of the hill. They had just recovered from the mortar fire on their position when Ridder’s first couple of armored Humvees had come around onto the ramp. Hase knew they didn’t have any weapons that could stop those vehicles, but was assured that the IEDs that Apache had put in would do the job. He positioned Helmut and Heaven, so they could form a cross-fire from their rifles to stop any troops from retreating up and out of the ramp once the IEDs went off. He then retreated to a small camouflaged cave he had dug into the mountain-side and took up residence, keeping his eye sight zeroed in on the approach down the ramp to the garage. He held in his hand a detonator, so he could initiate the enormous and devastating IEDs. He wanted to get as many vehicles and men into the blast area as possible before initiating the chaos. Some of the mines that had been hastily placed by Apache were in actuality, shaped C 4 which when activated, would blow upward through their hidden redoubts under the ramp and funnel their explosions upward, ripping through the underbellies of most of the vehicles. The other IEDs had been some claymores which had been placed about a foot off of the ground and into the walls of the ramp. When they were activated, they would blow out thousands of tiny balls at a high rate of speed, ripping through flesh and light armor to cause dismemberment and death. Hase had to be patient for this to go down properly.
He heard the distant gunfire from Harry, Howser and Hunter, and knew they were taking care of their assignments, which included destroying the mortars and going after the command officers and vehicles. The Humvees slowed as they continued their approach down the ramp, being cautious and looking for targets for their mounted M 240 and MK 40 grenade launchers. Men followed behind and dribbled onto the ramp and down toward the garage door. Hase waited another long excruciating minute before shifting in his hiding spot to check and see if all of the soldiers had entered his little killing ground. The ground below him shifted and spilled a small amount of rocks causing them to cascade downward toward the troops waiting below. He stopped moving and held his breath, hoping that the troops down below would not notice the small avalanche, giving away his hiding spot. He finally relaxed and took in a small breath, when an even larger avalanche of rocks and dirt let go from his hastily-dug hole and picked up momentum and more debris as it fell. He cursed under his breath as the troops looked up and spotted him. Hase threw his arms around his head and tried to retreat further into his hole, but it was too small to give him much protection. Suddenly, the air around exploded with the sound of what could have been angry hornets and wasps, but in actuality were rounds hitting the area around him. Heaven and Helmut saw what was happening and each let loose a magazine worth of well-aimed shots, peppering the troops who were actively firing on Hase. This caused more of the troops around the Ridder forces to take cover around the armored Humvees and return fire in their direction.
Hase watched in horror as the MK 40 grenade launchers started to swivel in Helmut’s direction. Hase couldn’t wait for a better time and squeezed the triggers in his hands, initiating the IEDs. The ramp exploded in well-timed explosions which rumbled down and then back up the ramp. The shaped charges went first, obliterating the vehicles and adding their bits and pieces to the claymores shrapnel that tore through the remaining men. Hase watched as the explosions took on the semblance of one giant explosion of gas, shrapnel, and super-heated diesel fuel. The light had gone from a bright white light when the first charges exploded to a deep red, and then into a yellow which could rival the sun for a brief moment. Hase hadn’t had time to warn Helmut or Heaven to his hasty decision to blow the IEDs early, and they were thrown back off of their feet for ten feet and they were deposited onto the hard-packed dirt and rocks around them. Their armor had protected them from serious injury, but both felt like they had gone twenty rounds with the famed Muhammad Ali when he’d been in his prime. But being the tier one operator they were, they recovered quickly and rolled from their landing spots and up onto their knees, pointing the barrels of their rifles out toward where they thought the ramp had been located.
Heaven had witnessed the plan falling apart almost immediately as Ridder forces had fired toward Hase’s blown cover. Heaven didn’t hesitate, he brought his rifle’s scope onto the troops and fired quick but well-aimed shots into them. He made sure to take out the men in the rear first, to not alert the rest of the troops. He blew threw his magazine in seconds, but each shot had delivered a soul to Hell, feeding the Devil’s ferocious appetite for sinners and the damned. He clocked Helmut doing the same thing that he was doing, and since they had not had time to discuss lanes of fire, sometimes their rounds hit the same targets at the same time. Heaven’s rifle clicked as his magazine had delivered its last projectile of death. He was in the action of releasing the magazine and groping for a new one to replace it when the air around him heated up almost instantly, as if the Devil himself had thrown open the doors of Hell, unleashing the power of his pits of damnation and brimstone. Heaven felt himself being thrown into the air like a ragdoll and then as if a giant hand had come down from the sky and punched him, he was thrown into the rocks and hard ground, blowing the air from his lungs, making it feel as if he was drowning, and he could not force the air back into his lungs. He let his years of training and fine-honed edge take over and act without his mind. He found himself rolling on the ground and then his knees appeared underneath him, lifting his body into a firing stance. His hands finished what they were in the middle of doing when the explosion had ignited around him, they dropped the magazine and reloaded a new one, then pulled back on the charging handle before he could catch up to what he was doing. He found himself looking down the sights of his rifle and his finger began to squeeze the trigger, placing shots down range into men trying to evacuate up the ramp. All of this had happened in the blink of an eye. His brain and lungs still did not fully understand what ha
d happened. He let his trained actions take care of his mission as he bent his will to force his lungs to inflate with drawn-in air from his gaping mouth.
He felt the wondrous oxygen fill his lungs and provide his starving brain with the energy it so desired to continue to operate. He forced himself to check on Helmut when his magazine ran dry and his hands went through their practiced actions of reloading. Heaven found Helmut also on his knees and pouring hot metal death down onto the survivors. Heaven thanked God that Helmut had come through the other side alive. Singed and bruised, but alive. He went back to his orders and stopped the Ridder troops from retreating back up the ramp.
It was when all fell quiet and no troops remained moving down below that Heaven risked a look over to Hase’s location. He saw new holes in the ground all around Hase’s hiding spot, but he saw no sign of movement or Hase. Heaven looked over the ramp to Helmut’s position and got his attention. He signed to him with his hands that he wanted Helmut to go check on Hase as Heaven held their position. Helmut signed back his understanding and moved quickly but cautiously toward Hase.
Helmut hurt. His entire body felt bruised and abused. Every joint and nerve ending shot waves of fire through him which each step he took toward Hase’s hole. But Helmut’s training, as well as the rest of Delta, had included lessons on how to compartmentalize his pain and allowed him to focus on his mission and actions. He would deal with the pain when it was all over, or if a bullet to his brain or heart would take it away. He continued advancing, using his scope to scan the area around him and Hase’s position. When he got closer, he dropped his rifle on its sling and pulled his .45 sidearm from his chest holster and held it in two hand grip, pointing it to the ground, ready to come up quickly if he needed it. As he came even closer, he became more and more sure that Hase hadn’t survived. But then a hand appeared, pushing dirt out and down the slope toward the ramp. Helmut hurried over and dropped to his knees, holstered his .45 and dug with both hands as fast as he could. The hand found one of his and gripped hard, Helmut grabbed on and pulled with all of his might. At first, nothing happened. But then, inch by inch the wrist became free, and then the forearm. After pulling with all of his might for what seemed like hours, but in reality didn’t last more than a minute or so, Hase’s head popped out of the hole. He was covered in dirt and small rocks, but other than that, he seemed fine.
Zombie Theorem (Book 3): The End Game Page 22