David Robbins - Green Bay Run

Blade tensed, waiting for a sign that the Technic intended to squeeze the trigger, intending to launch himself at the proper instant.

“The Director buzzed just a few minutes ago,” Perinn said, dabbing at his mouth with his left sleeve, and nodded at a portable military field radio resting on the desk. “He told us you’d escaped and ordered the colonel to collect all the man together at the southwest gate. We were on our way there when the colonel remembered he’d left your gear in the closet.” Perinn paused and grinned. “He didn’t want you to get your hands on your weapons, so we came back.”

“What now?” Blade asked, inching forward slightly.

“The Director wants you in a bad way. He’s got something special planned for you, but I don’t know what it is.”

Blade assumed the trooper must be referring to the implanta-tion. He prepared himself for a headlong rush, wishing for a distraction and getting his wish.

Unexpectedly, Colonel Hufford gurgled and started to rise.

Captain Perinn glanced down at his superior officer for a fraction of a second, and perceived even as he did that the giant was in motion, coming right at him. He automatically fired.

The Bushmaster Auto Rifle went empty and Samson tossed it aside.

He’d used the last of his spare magazines, and now had to rely on his Auto Pistols. His hands swooped to the swivel holsters strapped around his waist, holsters he had designed himself and the Family Gunsmiths had constructed. He took hold of the synthetic pistol grips and swung the barrels up. Both breakaway holsters parted at the seams, and he immediately snapped off rounds at the walking dead, felling six in rapid succession.

But still they came on. The Automatons had now spread out in a 40-foot line along the fence and were attempting to scale the fence in their slow, methodical fashion.

So far Samson had been able to hold his own and keep the ghouls out.

They were ridiculously easy targets as they came to the top of the fence or the gate, and he picked them off one after the other. The dead littered the ground. For a brief moment he believed he had overreacted, that the Automatons weren’t that much of a threat.

And then it happened.

All of the walking dead inexplicably stiffened, their entire bodies going rigid, their eyes wide as saucers. For seconds they stood perfectly still.

Suddenly, incredibly, they began to jerk and twitch and flail their arms, walking in small circles, their heads rocking from side to side. Those on the fence fell off.

Dear Lord! Samson marveled. What was happening? He lowered the Auto Pistols, confounded. What could have caused them to act so bizarrely?

The grotesque dance of the dead persisted for a full minute, and ended as abruptly as it started. Reeling or swaying, the Automatons stood in place, their facial features locked in outlandish grimaces.

What now? Samson wondered.

And the very next second he received his answer when the creatures, as one, turned toward the campus and renewed their assault on the security fence. Only this time their attack was different, this time they went about their task with a vengeance, striving to pull the fence down and batter through the gate, their countenances reflecting a feral madness, an unquenchable bloodlust. Despite the wounds they had sustained, they ripped and tore at the barbed wire, their blood spraying the ground.

The Nazarite opened up with the Auto Pistols, slaying foes as swiftly as before, but now they were moving faster and making more progress, and even though he killed and killed, they succeeded in breaching the fence, in tearing down a six-foot section to the left of the gate.

The instant the fence crumpled, the Automatons poured through the gap.

They were inside!

Samson retreated a few yards, firing as he did, emptying the left Auto Pistol and then the right. Before he could hope to reload, they swarmed upon him. He was forced to discard the Bushmasters and resort to his malletlike fists, slugging every Automaton that came within reach of his steely sinews. Every blow produced a resounding thud and sent an Automaton to the ground. He swung to one side, then the other, to the rear and the front, always in motion, a human whirlwind endowed with the power of a dynamo.

But even dynamos have limits.

Because Yama had tried to bring the Wilkinson to bear on the fleeing form of the Director, he was unable to compensate and train the barrel on the second tech before the man reached him.

The technician uttered a piercing scream, perhaps to spur his flagging courage, and swept both of his fists at the Warrior’s exposed throat.

Yama deftly blocked the man’s arms, using his left forearm to batter the technician aside, then smacked the barrel across the man’s temple, staggering his foe. He brought his right knee up into the tech’s crotch, and the man screeched at the top of his lungs. Using the Wilkinson stock, Yama clubbed him twice.

His eyes rolling upward in their sockets, the technician collapsed.

An acrid odor filled Yama’s nostrils, and he rotated to find the transmitter in flames and bright ribbons of electricity arching between several of the internal components. He remembered the words of the Director: “If you shoot up the transmitter, you might cause each transistor to short. If that happens, the pain will drive them berserk.”

Samson!

Yama spun and raced from the building. He sprinted toward the tree, wondering what could have happened to Melissa and why she hadn’t warned him about the noncom. When he reached the tree, he understood.

The sight he beheld transfixed him and stirred him to the depths of his soul.

The walking dead had breached the fence and were swarming around Samson in a frenzied effort to bring the Nazarite down. They punched and clawed and tore at his camouflage fatigues, a crazed pack of rabid jackals striving to slay a mighty lion. But Samson was proving to be the equal of his namesake. He rained a torrent of blows on the Automatons, his fists steely pistons, his bony knuckles thudding into foe after foe after foe.

Dozens upon dozens were already down, the majority never to rise again, their foreheads caved in or the skulls split open. Yet still they came on, and it was clear the Nazarite was beginning to tire.

A scream tore from Yama, a scream that originated in his gut and tore from his throat unbidden, a scream of commingled rage and affection for one of his few, true friends, a scream the likes of which he hadn’t voiced in more years than he could remember. “ Samson !”

Yama ran toward the battle, realizing he couldn’t use the Wilkinson because he might accidentally wing the Nazarite. He took ten strikes, and only then did he spot Melissa, not 15 feet in front of him. She was on her knee, holding the Smith and Wesson with both hands, apparently ready to fire. “Melissa! Don’t!” he shouted.

She glanced around as he sped to her side.

“You could hit Samson,” Yama told her before she uttered a syllable.

“But—” Melissa began.

“Here. Take this,” Yama ordered, and shoved the Wilkinson at her.

“What? Why do—”

“Take it!” Yama snapped.

Startled, she grabbed the weapon. “What are you going to do?”

“Stay here. If the Automatons come after you, head for the west side of the campus. You might be able to sneak out without being spotted by the Technics.”

“But what about you?” Melissa asked, too late, because the man in blue had dashed off and was now rushing toward the southeast gate. She glanced at the machine gun in her left hand, perplexed. How was he going to fight the walking dead without it?

Her answer came a few moments later.