“Sure. Let’s do this,” Carver said.
Carver pointed across the street where two giant hangars were sitting. There was a concrete road that led to a concertina-topped, chain-linked fence. The double gate stood open, its doors pulled back, partially torn from their hinges. They had easy access to the tarmac beyond. Flanking the road up to the gate were a couple of buildings that were remarkably intact.
“Just up that road, and we’re on the tarmac. The bladders should be to the right, stored outside the north wall of the hangar.”
“Hope Jacobs is right,” Keele said.
“Let’s find out.”
Shrek moved forward, Carver guiding him up the concrete road to the edge of the right outbuilding. They froze for a minute, letting Shrek’s nose and ears work their magic.
“What is it, boy?” Carver asked the dog.
Shrek remained motionless, then his posture began to stiffen.
“What’s wrong?” Keele whispered into his neck mic.
“I don’t know,” Carver said.
Ten more seconds failed to satisfy the Mal, and Carver couldn’t decide if they needed to move forward or retreat.
“We’re out in the open here,” Shader said. “I say we clear this building and reassess the situation.”
“Copy that,” Carver said.
He led the Mal past a couple metal garage doors, to a side entrance but found it locked, prompting Carver to whisper a quiet curse.
“Here. Let me,” Shader said.
The SEAL produced his lock pick set and began to work the tumblers. He gave a gratifying grunt as it clicked open, and he turned the knob.
The steel door pushed in and Carver led Shrek into the first room.
It was a supply and maintenance building with stainless steel countertops and metal military desks. The musty space showed a thick veneer of dust covering every exposed surface. Beyond the office space was steel cabinetry and shelving, all filled with a plethora of aviation supplies and parts. The filtered moonlit sky glowed lightly through several wire-reinforced windows, giving the team a bit of light.
Shrek’s posture relaxed slightly after they entered, but the three warriors cleared the building anyway.
“Whatever set him off isn’t in here,” Carver said as they finished their sweep. “It’s got to be outside or in the other outbuilding.”
Shader checked his watch. “We’ve made good time. Let’s hydrate while I contact Seahawk One. They need to be on station as soon as we have the bladder strapped up.”
Shader keyed the fleet frequency.
“Seahawk One, this is Red Team. Do you copy? Over.”
“Red Team, this is Seahawk One. We copy you. Over.”
Shader was about to reply but was interrupted.
“Quiet,” Carver hissed.
Shader glanced at Carver and Shrek. The Mal stood frozen, staring at the garage doors.
“Seahawk One, hold for further,” Shader said.
Shrek’s nape hair began to rise, and his posture stiffened. His lips curled back, exposing his teeth.
The team froze, not even a breath could be heard. Carver counted almost twenty seconds before the first sounds found their way into the room. It was a tiny human cry.
Keele turned to say something but Carver held up his hand, shushing the young Marine.
A second weeping call was then followed by a cacophony of screams, and the horrific memories made six months ago come crashing back from the past. For Shader and Keele, it had been in the underbelly of the Inglewood Forum where they first heard this horror. For Carver, it had been in the Temecula Hospital. They instantly knew what was moving nearby.
The sound of hell was approaching. A large pack of Variants was on the move outside, and they had humans in their midst.
Carver pressed his hand on Shrek’s neck. “Blijf,” he whispered, commanding the dog to stay.
He went to a window and glanced out of the dust-covered glass. He could see up the road and onto the tarmac between two of the hangars. Movement forced Carver to retreat into the dark room.
The crescent moon and starlight gave the concrete a light-blue tint. The overhead clouds moved across the sky, interrupting the hazy azure radiance. He flipped his NV glass down and the scene lit up with a lime-green glow.
Variants began to appear from one of the hangars. They crept into the open and formed a half-circle, all staring back through the fence’s open gate, almost directly at the building the fire team was hiding in. Had they been discovered? Carver could feel their eyes boring into his. But the creatures weren’t moving toward them. In fact, they appeared lethargic, their thin bodies disjointed and broken. Their movements were almost painful to watch as they shifted from one deformed leg to another.
“They almost look anorexic,” Keele whispered.
“What the hell are they doing?” Shader asked. “They’re just standing there, like they’re waiting for something.”
Carver looked through his rifle’s magnified optics. The monsters came into focus, their pale skin hanging from their frames. After six months of constant exposure to the elements, little remained of their clothing. Carver could see their gaunt bodies through the torn fabric, their ribs protruding almost through the skin. Stretched, atrophied muscle and bone attached their skeletal arms to their torsos. They were animated Halloween specters, and Carver almost felt sorry for them.
Another human cry echoed off the enormous metal hangars. The crowd of Variants became animated, their teeth gnashing and hands flailing in the air. But they didn’t move from their spots, even as they became increasingly agitated.
Carver cursed under his breath. He could sense something wasn’t right. The creatures weren’t acting like before. These seemed to have control over themselves with a calmness or purposefulness that he’d never encountered. It made no sense.
Carver flipped his NV monocular back up and waited for his right eye to readjust to the ambient light. His left eye, however, was working just fine and movement on the road caught his attention.
A mass of Variants was ambling toward the gates from outside of the fence line, led by one of the most massive creatures Carver had ever seen. The large Variant’s head was crowned with a patchy shock of bright red hair. Its muscles rippled, and it stood almost a foot above the rest of the pack. As they moved toward the open gate, the haggard infected that were standing inside began to chirp. Their animalistic screeches grew in size and urgency.
He suddenly felt Shrek at his side. The Mal leaned against his leg, quivering from excitement. A metal worktable sat next to the window. Carver patted the top gently and looked down at the war dog. “Hier,” he commanded.
Shrek leapt onto the countertop while Keele and Shader shifted around the Mal. All four of them now had a clear view of the primal theater playing out in front of them.
“Well, I guess we found out what happened to Carrot Top,” Shader said.
Keele was about to give the SEAL a snarky reply, when the source of the human cries came into view. “Oh my God,” he whispered.
Two Variants walking behind their massive leader were each hauling a human form over their shoulders in a fireman’s carry. As they approached the open gate, the leader turned onto the tarmac. The waiting throng erupted with a ghastly cheer. The cries from the deformed reminded Carver of the monkey cages he’d seen as a child.
“It’s a hunting party,” Shader hissed.
Staring through the thick glass, the Variants’ high-pitched screams echoed off the reinforced window. Between the flat green glow of the light-enhanced monocular and the muffled sounds of the infected creatures, Carver felt like he was watching the scene play out on an old black-and-white television.
The two humans were dumped in front of the waiting throng while the giant Variant squatted down next to one of their prisoners. It was a woman, and the Variant grabbed her by the back of her neck.
That’s when the situation turned horrific. The other human was a girl, no more than fou
r or five years old. She jumped up and ran to the woman lying at the feet of the giant Variant. The adult grabbed the little one and threw her arms around her, clutching the girl to her breast. Both of their sobs could be heard through the metal walls of the building.
“No!” Keele said. He clicked off his M4’s safety and spun around to rush out of the room.
Shader grabbed the young Marine and pulled him back. “Are you crazy? There’s over a hundred Variants out there,” Shader whispered.
“We have to save them,” Keele hissed.
“We can’t. We don’t have enough bullets.”
“We have to do something,” he pled. “That’s a child out there. I have a niece her age. We have to save them.”
“I want to kill those bastards too, but us dying won’t change what’s going to happen,” Shader said.
“Too late,” Carver said. “It’s already going down.”
One of the emaciated Variants that had formed the original semi-circle jumped from the crowd and tried to latch onto the little girl. Their massive leader grabbed the wraith by the neck and in one, quick twist, ripped its head off. He tossed it into the crowd before kicking the headless corpse into the waiting throng. Within seconds, the other Variants were fighting over the bony body, tearing it apart and gnawing on its leathery flesh.
“Alpha male,” Carver muttered.
The other two grunted in agreement. Even Shrek let out a low growl.
The Alpha turned back to the terrified woman and yanked the child away. A tiny snap and a high-pitched scream followed. Something had been broken or dislocated. The Alpha just grinned as he kept the woman pinned down with his foot, pressing it on her chest. He tossed the little girl onto the tarmac about twenty feet away. Time, space, and consciousness itself melted away as the child curled up and stopped moving, the horror freezing her in place.
“No!” Keele screamed before Shader could put his hand over the Marine’s mouth.
The Alpha looked up and began to sniff the air. They’d been heard.
Shader put Keele in a headlock, with his right arm around the kid’s neck while the left arm locked the other in place. His left hand was cupped over Keele’s mouth.
Carver’s heart began to pound as he stared out at the mass of Variants less than fifty yards away. The Alpha continued to sniff and turn, searching for the source of the sound. Carver had to control the adrenaline rush. He commanded his pounding heart to slow down and began to force himself to breathe slowly and deeply. All the while, he kept watching the Alpha scan its surroundings.
“Are you squared away, Marine?” Shader hissed.
Keele nodded and tapped Shader’s forearm.
“You do that again, and I’ll put you down myself.” Shader pushed Keele away.
A few moments later, they heard a barking cry echo from the hangar to their right.
The Alpha reluctantly stopped his search and returned the ape-like grunt.
“Hey, something’s happening,” Carver whispered.
They all stared out at the Variant group. A pack of females ambled across the concrete. Tattered clothing revealed their infected bodies. Sores, cuts, and scabrous flesh marked their torsos, but these females were different. They were heavier than the others with enough mass to mask the bones beneath.
“Look at the third one,” Shader whispered. “She’s pregnant.”
The infected woman’s belly was swollen.
“They’re all pregnant, or just were,” Carver added.
Every one of them was well-fed and had enlarged breasts. The ones that had already given birth had sagging fatty flesh hanging down over their groins.
The Alpha grunted and the females barked back.
“Holy hell. What are those things?” Keele gasped.
Another group of creatures advanced. Several of the Variant females gently guided them forward, as a parent would urge on their children.
Crawling on all four limbs, the small, infected beasts showed very little resemblance to their mothers.
Their skulls had morphed into a cone-like shape, and they’d developed bat-like ears that rotated and flexed as they moved. Carver recoiled and turned away, willing his mind to accept what he was seeing. What kind of monsters had these creatures produced?
“They’ve got armor,” Shader said.
Carver forced himself to turn back as the deformed, mutated children advanced. They had scaly plates that encircled their bodies, reminding Carver of the changes to Cyclops and his infected coyote pack they’d wiped out earlier. The children had developed the same protection.
The five creatures stopped about ten yards from the downed human child.
“Nooo,” the woman cried. She looked up at the Alpha and wailed. “Please. Take me. Don’t hurt my baby!”
The Alpha scanned his clan, a row of sharp, razor-like teeth gleaming from his macabre smile. As the woman at his feet continued to plead, he let out a roar. The crowd answered with their own battle cry.
The Alpha pointed his deformed, claw-like hand at the prone girl and barked at the Variant children. They immediately responded, rushing forward on all fours, their tongues snapping in and out of their mouths. Within moments, they had lunged onto the child and began to rip her flesh. The little girl let out one pitiful cry, then went silent.
Keele gasped and began to shout. Shader clamped his hand over the man’s mouth and grabbed him in a giant bear hug. The young Marine quietly sobbed as he turned away from the slaughter.
The Alpha roared with approval, and his minions barked their support.
The woman, momentarily frozen in horror, reacted. A glint of metal appeared in her hand, and she slashed at the Alpha’s leg. He screamed in pain, jumping back from the sudden attack.
Now freed from the Alpha’s grasp, she rushed toward the pile of juveniles that were feasting on her daughter and dove onto the back of the closest creature. The small, armored beast tried to roll away, but the woman latched onto the plating at its neck and drove the knife into its spine. It screamed and went still.
The other juveniles recoiled and hissed at her. Before she could bring her knife back up, they leapt onto her and began shredding her flesh as well. Their speed was remarkable. The mother’s dying screams echoed inside the maintenance building as the juveniles tore the skin and muscle from her face and neck. The sounds of her final moments were seared into Carver’s brain.
The Alpha angrily rushed forward and stood over the three bodies. He bent and picked up the dead juvenile then roared. The other juveniles stopped their feeding frenzy and backed away. The Variant leader turned to the adults and strode forward, carrying the small Variant’s corpse. He screeched and barked. A lone Variant stepped forward. The Alpha laid the dead juvenile down and pointed at it. The male Variant stepped up and bent down next to the corpse. The Alpha grabbed the adult creature’s exposed neck and ripped it open. The Variant fell over the juvenile body as black, chunky blood spurted from its fatal wound.
“What the hell?” Carver said in stunned disbelief.
“I think that was the one that carried the woman in. He was executed. Probably for not finding the knife,” Shader whispered.
Keele’s quiet sobs had abated. “I couldn’t have imagined anything like this.”
“Juvenile Variants that look like armored tanks,” Shader said.
“Those little bastards are fast, too,” Carver added. “What the hell are we going to do now?”
“It’s a freaking nightmare,” Shader replied glumly. “This is just all kinds of wrong.”
“What are we going to do?” Keele asked.
“We wait them out. Hopefully, they’ll move on before dawn,” Shader replied.
Shader contacted the Seahawk and informed them of the situation. The helicopter returned to the ship to await their call and preserve their precious Avgas. Gonzalez reported that he was in good shape and would wait for further instructions.
The team quietly retreated to the interior of the building. With so ma
ny Variants hovering nearby, the mission was scrubbed. They’d have to wait for the right moment to make their escape.
***
Carver woke with a jolt. He gulped several deep breaths and looked around. He was surrounded by the heavy, dust-laden air inside the abandoned maintenance building, and it was still pitch-black.
He reached up to activate his night vision monocular, but instead, left it up in the off position and concentrated on the sounds around him. He could hear the low growl of Shader snoring next to him, and of Keele shifting his weight as the Marine stood watch nearby.
Shrek’s breathing had slowed down as well, which meant the Mal was awake and waiting for a command. He reached out and found his faithful dog’s neck and gently rubbed it. Shrek leaned into his hand and gratefully accepted the affection. They’d both been through a lot so far, and the night wasn’t over yet.
Carver rose and found Keele standing near the window. He whispered. “Status?”
“No change. They’re still out there,” Keele replied softly.
Carver flipped his monocular down and looked through the open gate. He could see Variants slowly wandering past the spot where the two humans and juvenile had been killed. They would hesitate and look down at the bloodstained concrete, then move on.
“It’s like they’re checking the spot for any leftovers,” Keele grunted.
“Like someone constantly opening the refrigerator, looking for food. As if something is going to magically appear since the last time they looked.”
“Sick, isn’t it?”
“Maybe some of their humanity stayed with them,” Carver said.
“There’s nothing human about those things,” Keele hissed.
Carver didn’t reply at first. The Variants might be monsters, but they came from human stock. He also didn’t want to remind Keele of the evil mankind had already shown. Within the last century alone the world had produced Stalin, Hitler, Communist China, and the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia. Over a hundred million souls slaughtered under the guise of National Socialism or Communism. The Variants’ only sin was harvesting humans for food, instead of killing them over politics, religion, or land.
Extinction Survival Series (Book 3): Cost of Survival Page 5