John Holmes: Even Zombie Killers Can Die

She got up and came around to give me a kiss on the forehead. “Only because it’s our friends.”

“Of course.” I wanted out of the game as much as she did.

One thing about the Army, you never know when it was going to through you a curveball. I wasn’t expecting the one we got an hour later.

“Lost Boys, this is Orange Main, over.”

I got up from the table, where I had been cleaning my own weapons. Brit was upstairs checking on Red, and I was about to pack it in for the night. The call from the Operations TOC at Fort Orange came as a complete surprise. It was being relayed through the retrans station at Firebase Horse.

“Lost Boys, this is Orange Main, over.”

“Orange Main, this is Lost Boys, over.”

“Lost Boys, this is Liberty actual, over”

Damn. The Task Force Liberty commander was on the horn.

“This is Lost Boys Six, send your traffic, over.”

“Nick, I am recalling you to active duty, along with any other inactive members of your team.”

I stared at the handmike. WTF, over? Recalled to active duty?

“Liberty Main, this is Lost Boys Six. Say again, over.”

“You heard me, Nick. Get your shit together, get Brit, and get every goddamned settler you can. All hell has broken loose along the line. A Chinook will be at your place at 1900 hours tomorrow. Bring enough gear for a week.”

“Roger, be advised. India Sierra Tango One is missing, believed captured outside Burlington. We have one WIA from the team here, over.”

“Understood. Figured as much when they dropped off the net. Bring him along; he’ll get medical care at the CSH. See you tomorrow. Liberty Actual out.”

Damn, what the hell was that all about? I called upstairs to Brit, asking her to come down. Then I got on the radio again and switched over to what we called the “local” band.

Within a ten mile radius, up and down the river, people who were tired of living on government handouts and working the fields around Albany for FEMA had struck a deal with the Army. They were given radios, guns, ammo, seeds and equipment, and one day’s assistance from a platoon of Combat Engineers setting up a defensible position, preferably at a useable farm. In return, they were on call to assist against any attacks and provide manpower to the Army when asked. So far, there were an even dozen loners and two families who had taken up the offer, and we often hooked up with them to “clear” the local area of zombies. Our place acted as a trading post for them. Most were ex-military who didn’t care to deal with the government any more than they had to.

Everyone was supposed to tune in for net call at 2100 hours each night to check in. Three weeks ago, one of them, a tough old guy named Salk, had missed his call. Several of us had made for his place at first light, moving up the river to an old farmstead just south of Schuylerville. We had found a pile of dead zombies around the farm, but one had gotten him in the end, and Brit shot him through the eye as he stumbled towards us, dragging his half eaten leg, snapping his jaws. You rolled the dice and you took your chances. We went and hunted down the rest of the Zs, a small group of a dozen that were stumbling down Route 4.

At 2059, I keyed the handmike, waited a second, then initiated the netcall. When everyone had answered up in order, I got down to business.

“All stations, the Army is calling in their chips. I need you all here no later than 1700 tomorrow with a week’s worth of gear and ammo. “

A chorus of curses broke out over the radio, most along the line of “Fuck the Army.” I waited them out, then got back on.

“They helped you when you needed it. Now it’s payback time, and your fields can wait a week, break.”

I keyed the mic again. “Jablonski and Smith, you are excused. I know you have families that need taking care off. See you all at 1700 tomorrow.”

I wasn’t going to break up any families again, but if Task Force Liberty was calling in the Reserves, it was serious. I flicked on Fox News as Brit came down the stairs. We caught the tail end of the hourly newscast, and I recognized the location on the video. Thousands of reanimated corpses were streaming down route 9, overwhelming the barricades at I-84. As I watched, the footage switched over to a shot of a cruise missile slamming into the center span of the Tappan Zee Bridge, 20 miles north of New York City. Hundreds of bodies fell into the middle of the river.

“Damn!” said Brit.

“Damn.” I agreed with her.

The news wasn’t any better the next morning. I had powered up the generator to supplement our batteries, and left the TV on all morning. I tried to pick apart details on what was happening, but all that I got out of it was that there was a shit storm of zombies heading north out of NYC. Apparently something had stirred them up, but the Army wasn’t saying. As I watched, the Verrazano Bridge fell into Lower New York Harbor, dropped by the Marines defending Staten Island. Another couple of billion New Dollars down the drain, and something that wouldn’t be rebuilt in my lifetime. Dumbasses could have just knocked a hole in both decks instead of dropping the whole span. Stupid Jarheads.

Red was still knocked out, helped along I’m pretty sure by something Brit had given him. We had carried the kid downstairs, and he lay strapped to a folding stretcher. Our packs were sitting by the door, weapons sitting on top of them, and I was adjusting the straps on my leg when we heard Joe call out to someone. It was obviously someone he knew, or he would have challenged them. This sounded more like a greeting than a warning.

The first one I saw was the last one I wanted to see. I actually didn’t see him first, I smelled him. Donny the Butcher. We never could find out his last name. The guy stunk to high heaven, and never, ever washed. He claimed that the smell kept the zombies off of him, and he was still crusted with blood from the last clearing trip we had been on.

“OUT!” yelled Brit. “Get your nasty ass out of my house. Go jump in the rive, before I throw you in. I’m not riding or fighting next to your nasty ass.” He stopped dead in the doorway, and beat a hasty retreat. Donny was terrified of Brit for some reason. I sighed, got up, and shot Brit a look. She shrugged her shoulders and made a “what?” gesture with her hands. I shook my head and walked out.

Donny, who had actually jumped into the river, was soon joined by a couple of others, and I looked them over as we did checks on our equipment. There were twelve all told. Tough-looking men, even two women, who had spent the last winter hacking out a living in an area that was rapidly turning back into a wilderness of ruined buildings and deserted fields. The biggest group was five guys, all ex-military, who were slowly looting Mechanicville of gold and silver. The rest, like Donny, were loners who enjoyed being away from society.

The leader of the Mechanicville crew, a burly former Marine named Jim Lock, came over to me, asking what was going on.

“Best I can tell, Jim, is that the lines are breached somewhere south of Poughkeepsie, and the Army is shitting a brick. Apparently all the Zs in NYC have gone apeshit.”

He nodded and scratched his chin. “Think that is going to cause any problems here?”

“Dunno. It seems to be only the NYC area, and between your crew and the rest of us, we’ve cleared everything out on this side of the river, up to the Saratoga radiation zone. That and patrols from Firebase Horse have pretty much tagged every Z in the local area.”

I knew what he was worried about. Brit, Joe and I had worked hard getting a crop in, and building the farm up into a defensible position. It could hold its own for a week or two, but more than that, we might have some surprises when we came home. If we came home.