Ex-Patriots

Chapter 19 - Sad Songs THEN

I didn’t even want to be in the Army. I wanted to be in a jazz band. Get out of college, make a little money giving kids horn lessons, and spend my nights playing trumpet somewhere down in the Gaslamp district as Harry Harrison and the Starlighters or something like that. That was my real dream.

Yeah, I know. There was a writer named Harry Harrison, too. Only about ten thousand people have told me that, thank you.

Then the White House had to start this stupid war in the Middle East while I was in high school and it looked like I might get drafted. People were talking about the draft, can you believe it? That was what I heard all through college. There hadn’t been a draft in forty years, and the last time was for a stupid, pointless war, too. If the Repugs stayed in power after the election, everyone on campus knew they’d keep the war going.

Dad sat me down. He’d done a stint in the Navy right out of high school and he explained why. If there’s a draft, they decide where you go. If you enlist on your own, you get a lot more say in where you go. He spent Vietnam on board the Will Rogers , slept in a warm bunk almost every night, and never got shot at once.

So I went to the recruiting office just before I graduated college and the Army officer told me there was an Army band. They’d actually pay me to play trumpet for four years. I signed up and told Dad it was one of the best decisions I’d ever made.

Yeah, I joined Krypton right after I made sergeant. What better way to stay off the front line than to volunteer for a stateside experiment? And there was a decent chance I’d end up in the control group, so I wouldn’t even have to deal with side effects or anything, right?

Little did I know.

I made the cut. The surgery took. Three weeks later I raised my horn to lips, took a firm grip, and dented the outer cylinders. Gus and Wilson thought it was funny as hell. Wilson dug up a bugle for me a few days later, left it on my bunk.

Fucktards.

Of course, all this was all kind of moot. Turns out no one’s just a musician when there’s a war going on. First it was in the Middle East, but then it was everywhere. The main instrument I had to play was my rifle, and since the exes showed up I’d gotten very proficient with it. Solos, duets, I even led a few six-piece numbers that got rave reviews under the name Staff Sergeant Harry Harrison and the Unbreakable Twenty-ones.

When it all went really crazy, it had been six weeks since our first attempt into Yuma. Four weeks since First Sergeant Paine blew his own head off and most lines of communication went dead. The last one said the feds had flown some super-robot out to Los Angeles, and that made Captain Freedom furious. He’d been arguing we should be on the front line all along, and Project Krypton had just been lost in the chaos of the Zombocalypse.

Yeah, Zombocalypse. Neat, huh? Gus told me that one.

Thirteen days since the first of a small army of exes staggered across a few miles of desert to pile against our fence line and fill the air with the staccato chatter of enamel and ivory.

Hard as it may be to believe, that wasn’t our biggest problem at the time. It was part of the problem, yeah, but the real issue was how we could work around it. The big problem was Doc Sorensen. The doc was crazy worried about his family. Turns out he had a wife and a teenage daughter back home. We caught him twice trying to steal a Humvee so he could go get them. Freedom pointed out to the old guy there was no way he’d make it over a thousand miles and back, but the doc didn’t care. He argued they couldn’t order a civilian around and threatened to quit the program.

That was when Smith stepped in. The monkey-boy finally started carrying his own weight. God knows how, but he’d pulled some strings and gotten Sorensen’s family on a plane heading out here. Only problem was we didn’t have an airstrip on the Krypton base. There are seven here at the proving ground, including one nobody’s supposed to know about, and the closest one’s about nineteen miles west and north of us.

Unlike Krypton, it wasn’t fenced off. There were exes all over it. A lot of them were wearing tiger-stripe camo and flight suits. I knew it was on a list of priority areas to reclaim as soon as things stabilized. Thing is, we needed it now.

The captain came up with a plan. A pretty solid one. We were going to co-ordinate landing time with a mobile unit. Unbreakable Twelve under Sergeant Washington was going to drive a Guardian armored vehicle to the airstrip and hit the runway at the same time as the plane. They collect the doc’s wife, daughter, and the pilot as soon as they touch down, then bring them back to Krypton safe and sound.

This was the other problem, because going off-base meant we had to open all three gates. Twice. And we hadn’t opened them since the wall of exes got here.

Most of us were on the gates. My section, Twenty-two, and Thirty-two were inside the first ring of fences. Captain Freedom had issued us all M16s on single-shot. They felt like toys after carrying a Bravo for months. Too light and too small. Their volume didn’t even go to eight, let alone eleven. All we were going to do was walk back and forth, stick our rifles through the fence, and pop exes as they headed for the gates. The catch was we only had two magazines each. The quartermaster was already rationing ammo, just to be safe. So one for the exit, one for the return.

Sections Eleven and Thirty-three had the second ring. When the gates opened they formed a single lane into the base. They were in charge of any exes that slipped in there. Sergeant Monroe, the new platoon sergeant, was with Eleven and itching for a chance to take out some of the dead.

And above us all, in one of the watchtowers, the captain was conducting the orchestra with a Mk 19 grenade launcher. They’d stripped off the vehicle mount and he had three or four cans of ammo with him. He could almost use the damned thing as a pistol. He was going to make a lot of noise away from the base. In theory, the exes would follow.

Colonel Shelly wasn’t too keen on any of this, but he and Smith had a talk and monkey-boy convinced him taking care of Sorensen was in all our best interests. Maybe there was still final testing to be done and if the doc left we were all going to explode or something. Smith talked with the soldiers from Twelve for half an hour, too, impressing the importance of this on them, asking them again and again if they were sure they were up for it, if they knew how to handle different things that might happen. I think in the end they were ready to smack him.

Actually, I know they were ready to smack him. Britney told me so when we met up for a good luck fuck in the armory before she left. Yeah, it’s frowned on, but believe me, once you’ve had superhuman sex or enhanced sex or whatever you want to call it…well, we weren’t going to give it up until they ordered us to. Besides, at the time I was pretty sure First Sergeant Kennedy didn’t know. She was serious about her new rank, and I’m sure she would’ve had us both over the coals. I found out a little later that she did know, and it was an awful way to find out.

Squad Twelve left with no problem. It all went smooth and by the numbers. Captain Freedom dropped a cluster of grenades about a hundred yards from the fence and half the exes wandered off to see what was making all the noise. They were halfway there and he dropped another cluster to keep their attention.

Yeah, I know what you’re thinking. Why didn’t he just use the grenades on the exes. I asked that, too, when we were going over the plan. Kennedy smacked me upside the head and reminded me the dead things were already dead (her exact words). The blast might mangle them, might even destroy one if it got caught just right, but odds are it’d just be wasting grenades. A mashed-up, slashed-up torso will kill a person pretty quick, but all it does is slow down exes.

In five minutes our teams in the outer ring had picked off about two hundred exes that wouldn’t leave the fence. The posts on the gates got pulled and Twelve got escorted out. They had one of the base’s five Guardians and Adams was behind the wheel. He floored it and kicked up a fan of dirt and dust as they shot across the desert. In theory they’d reach the airstrip in about thirty minutes, just as the plane was touching down.

Two hours passed. A long intermission.

We still had radio contact, and Kennedy made sure we got the updates she thought we needed. The plane had been twenty minutes late. Enough time for the armored vehicle at the airstrip to attract a lot of undead attention. It took a lot of close-quarters fire to get Mrs. Sorensen and not-yet-legal Sorensen into the Guardian. Sergeant Grant didn’t make it. Neither did the pilot. Another Twelve had been bitten hard and was bleeding, but we didn’t know who. But they had the package and they were heading home.

Sorensen was about halfway between the gates and the helipad. I could see him through the fences. His hair was pretty thin on the top and I remember wondering if he had any sunscreen on. When Kennedy told him the news he applauded.

About fifteen minutes later we saw the cloud of dust where the Guardian was coming across the desert to us. Everyone took their places. Squads Twenty-one, Twenty-two, and Thirty-two loaded fresh mags in our rifles. The two inside gates opened.

In the past two hours, most of the exes had wandered back to the fence. They were pretty determined to get in, what with all these tasty soldiers standing right on the other side. Freedom sent another volley of grenades out across the desert, about ninety degrees off from where the Guardian was coming in. A bunch of the exes at the back of the crowd turned and staggered towards the noise. Not as many as last time, but still a good chunk of them. He sent his second cluster and it attracted a few more.

Then the Guardian stopped. It was still a good two hundred yards from the outside gate. We heard the engine cough and give up under the clicking teeth. It was against protocol, but I switched over to the command channel.

“It’s got a fifty gallon tank,” snapped Kennedy’s voice. “How the hell are you out of gas?”

“Seven, this is Twelve. I don’t know,” said Britney. Sergeant Washington. I remember that, too. Forcing some distance between us right at that moment. Her voice was stressed. “We’re bone dry. The tank must have taken a hit or something.”

“A hit from what?” I looked up at Kennedy, standing near Freedom on the tower. I could almost see her grinding her teeth.

“I don’t know, First Sergeant!”

There were voices in the background when she talked. I could hear somebody muttering and another woman. Sorensen’s wife, wanting to know why they’d stopped. There was an edge to her voice.

A tiny figure leaped from the passenger side of the Guardian. There was a spare gas can on the roof. You wouldn’t carry one in combat, but it’s not like the exes had snipers hiding on rooftops. He looked around for a moment then dove back inside and slammed the door.

The exes saw him moving. They heard the door. They started to veer away from the captain’s grenade show and stumble toward the armored vehicle. A few by the fence turned and we shot them in the back of the head.

Washington came back on the radio. “Seven, this is Twelve. There’s no gas.”

“Twelve, this is Seven. Explain.”

“Seven, this is Twelve. There are no spare cans. We have no gasoline.”

I saw Kennedy shoot a glare down at Gus and Wilson. I’d be the first to think they fucked up, except I saw them loading two cans on the Guardian an hour before the mission. They should’ve been there.

Freedom set off another wave of explosions away from the carrier. A few exes paused, but most of them kept heading for the Guardian. Movement trumps sound in their tiny brains.

The grenades didn’t help things in the carrier, either. Civilians don’t do well with explosions that aren’t on television. Washington came back on the radio and a girl’s voice was shrieking in the background. “Start the engine,” she was yelling. “Please start the engine.”

“Seven, this is Twelve,” said Washington, “how should we proceed?”

The first of the exes had reached the Guardian. They could see the people inside through the narrow windows. They started clawing at the sides of the vehicle.

“Twelve, this is Seven, hold your position,” said Kennedy. “We’re going to figure a way to get you out of there.”

“Seven, this is Twelve. The Sorensens are not dealing well with this.” The muffled sound of teeth clicking together came over the radio with her voice.

“Twelve, this is Seven, understood,” she said. “Hold your position.”

There were about twenty exes around the armored vehicle. In five minutes there were going to be twice as many. “Twelve to Seven. Copy.”

“Don’t make me run for it,” said Adams in the background of the Guardian. I never thought he’d be one to panic. First night jitters, I guess. “Please don’t make me run.”

“What’s going on?” Sorensen was next to me. “Why did they stop out there?”

Freedom dropped a few grenades on the exes heading for the transport. It pulped some of them, but once the haze cleared I could see things with no legs dragging themselves towards the armored carrier. One of them had a hole in its stomach that daylight shined through.

Adams snapped. He kicked open the door of the Guardian, knocked a few exes back, and tried to run. He was an Unbreakable, after all. He had a chance. Not much of one, but a chance.

Then he yanked open the back door and pulled the girl out after him. Sorensen’s daughter. He was still going to try to get her to the base. Blood was gushing out of his nose where she’d tried to fight him off or something.

The doc pressed himself against the gate. I pulled him back so the exes wouldn’t chew his fingers off. “What’s he doing?” shouted Sorensen. “What’s he doing?”

Adams knocked down a bunch of exes. Hit them with his shoulder one after another. Even opened up on a few with his Bravo. He was maybe thirty yards from the Guardian, dragging the wailing girl behind him, when he stumbled. Stumble’s not the best word. He just jerked to a stop. At first I thought he slipped up on some zombie-mush from the barrage. Eddie Franklin had a better view and he told me later it was like one of his legs cramped up or something in the middle of the stride. A few people in the towers tried to give him cover fire, but it wasn’t enough.

The girl was screaming for her father. He heard her. We all heard her.

The exes swarmed over them. Even this far out we saw flashes of red from the girl. Adams fought for a few moments, even after his ACUs turned red. They were hidden by a press of exes, so we didn’t see them die. But I’m pretty sure we heard it, even over all the chattering teeth.

Sorensen started howling. No other word for it. Just this raw sound coming out of him.

Someone tried to pull the rear door shut on the Guardian and got dragged out. Three or four dead things were forcing their way through the driver’s door at the same time. I remember I heard screaming through the radio and the same screams off in the distance. It was a creepy stereo effect that made my stomach churn. Screams and gunfire and teeth.

I kept waiting for Washington—for Britney—to leap out of the transport and up onto the relative safety of the roof. She could last for an hour or two up there. Long enough for us to get another Guardian or a Humvee or something out there.

Sorensen was wailing in my arms. “Do something!” He looked at me and shouted up at Freedom. “Why aren’t you helping them?”

Somebody yanked my radio out of my ear. Kennedy was standing next to me. She’d leaped down from the tower. “Sergeant Harrison,” she told me, “escort the doctor away from the fence.”

Sorensen grabbed her sleeve. “You have to help them,” he screamed. He was crying so much his beard had two wet streaks in it. “You have to do something!”

“I’ll lead the recovery team,” I said. “Twenty-one can be out there in ten min—”

“Sergeant,” snapped Kennedy, “I am ordering you to escort the doctor out of sight of the fence and into that building. Clear?” She pointed over my shoulder.

“Yes, First Sergeant.” That’s when I knew Britney was dead. They were all dead. “Clear.”

I dragged the doctor away. I could bench press over nine hundred pounds, but he was twisting and flailing and shrieking and trying to get to the gate. If you’ve ever tried to hold a really determined four-year-old, that’s what I was dealing with. I didn’t look back. My radio was dangling around my neck and I could still hear the screams. There were less of them, but one of them was a woman.

I kicked open the doors of the admin building, broke one of the hinges, and dropped Sorensen into a lobby chair. He was just gone. He wasn’t moving. There was a vacant look in his eyes I remember from a few guys after their first live fire test. He couldn’t process what was happening. Who could blame him? He’d just seen his daughter taken down in front of him.

I thought about Britney. Three hours ago she’d been alive. I was very cold all of a sudden. Cold and empty, like everything in my belly had just vanished and left me hollow. I thought about sitting down, but I had a feeling I wouldn’t get back up if I did. I leaned against the wall.

Britney was dead. Everyone in Twelve was dead. There was never going to be an Army Band again. No horn lessons for kids. No nights playing jazz down in the Gaslamp. Nothing.

“Sergeant Harrison?” The doctor’s voice was small and reedy. He was hoarse from screaming.

“Yes, sir?”

He looked up at me. It was like locking eyes with a sad dog. He was calling me by name, but I don’t think he really knew who I was.

“Are they…” he started. He coughed, cleared his throat, and whispered, “Are they going out soon to rescue Eva and Madelyn?”