Pandemic

TWENTY-SEVEN.

Lt. Colonel Harry Lee’s eyes roamed across the big board and the drone footage rolling on multiple monitors. All displayed the progress of First Battalion’s scattered elements as they moved through Greater Boston’s clogged arteries and converged on Hanscom. The soldiers were fighting hard for every mile, their vehicles keeping just ahead of the mass migration of infected citizens pouring out of the burning city.

Major Walker had proven to be a slippery one, but he’d probably saved the battalion with his subversive maneuvering. Aside from the crazies, tens of thousands of dazed refugees were on the move. They were easy pickings on the street. The crazies killed or infected them, swelling their own numbers into an irresistible flood.

First Battalion was in full retreat. Lee was starting to tremble with exhaustion. He was sweating, and his body ached. He’d been standing for hours with every muscle clenched with tension. Those were his boys out there, and if they failed, it was game over. The burden of command brought a heady sense of responsibility he hadn’t anticipated.

He gratefully accepted a cup of strong coffee from a second lieutenant. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had some decent chow and sleep.

“Watch it,” he murmured as Alpha Company’s vehicles stacked up at a bottleneck. “Cover your flanks and rear until you get things squared away.”

He was about to ask for the radio when Captain Randy “Hallelujah” Hayes sent vehicles out in every direction to provide security to the main column. Lee saw the fifties rocking in the gun turrets. White particles fluttered to the ground around the gunners—ash falling from the sky as if it were snowing in high summer. Tracers zipped downrange. The big rounds chewed up people and vehicles.

Seeing the way the Alpha boys pounded their opposition made Lee consider—just for a moment—ordering them to turn around and go back into Boston. Concentrated, his lightfighters could deliver incredible firepower. They appeared almost invincible.

But appearances were deceiving. Pulling out was the right thing to do. Boston was a lost cause, its people fled or infected, its once proud buildings slowly converting into ash. Lee doubted his forces had enough bullets to do the job at this point.

“Radio,” he said.

A staff sergeant gave him the phone. Lee barked instructions to the Apaches assigned to provide top cover for Alpha. He directed cannon fire at several civilian vehicles speeding along an open stretch of road toward Alpha’s position.

He handed the radio back and sipped his coffee. On one of the video monitors, he kept watch on a speeding white Cadillac. Welded spikes protruded from its hood and roof, onto which a grisly array of severed heads had been mounted.

The vehicle wilted under chain gun fire from one of the Apaches then burst into a fireball.

Good work. Behind him, one of the staff sergeants whistled. The staff appeared to be in good spirits. The command post hummed with new energy. They were losing, but they were doing something. They had a new mission, one they could understand, one that had promise. They were getting the hell out from under the big hammer.

They weren’t retreating. No. He hadn’t put it like that during his speech at Prince’s funeral, which he’d kept short on platitudes and long on communicating the new strategy. He called it “redeployment.” They’d fought the good fight, accomplished what they could, and they were returning to Fort Drum. If there were infected at Drum, they’d clean house. If there were survivors, they’d help them.

The soldiers had looked back at him with faces lined with constant stress and fatigue. They didn’t cheer. But he saw a new gleam in their hollowed eyes. Lee hoped the men coming back from Boston felt the same way about their new mission. Together, they’d go to Fort Drum. They’d rest and refit then plan their next move.

Bravo Company approached the wire. They’d made it.

Lee heard cheering outside. “Major,” he said, “take over here. Back in five.”

Walker snapped to it. “Yes, sir.”

Lee wanted to greet Captain Marsh personally. It wasn’t going to be a pleasant meeting. He had bad news: The captain’s missing platoon had gone into one of the hospitals and had been virtually overrun. And Marsh was going to have to hand over his wounded, who would be locked up and cared for in a special quarantine facility on base.

All in all, the next few days would severely test Lee’s diplomatic skills. If he was going to succeed as the new commanding officer, he needed the support of the field officers.

He stepped out of the command post as the column of Humvees rolled through the gate and began to coil near the maintenance building. Soldiers shouted and slapped the metal hides of the vehicles as they rumbled past. The gunners smiled down at them and flashed the victory sign.

They stiffened at the sight of Lee.

One by one, they saluted him as they passed.