John Ringo - Islands of Rage and Hope

“Do not run me over, Edwards,” Faith radioed. “HEY! FRESH MEAT!” she screamed, waving her hands over her head.

“Fuck,” Barnard said, rolling out of the truck.

Faith had drawn her .45 and was servicing targets as the infected, blinded by the truck’s lights, turned from the unavailable meat and headed to apparently easier pickings. She dropped the pistol and clawed another out of her chest holster as the infecteds closed.

Barnard had barely gotten out of the truck when the lieutenant was swarmed.

“…sometimes I get overcome thinkin’ ’bout…” Faith sang, slamming a trench knife into an infected’s face. “…makin’ love in the green grass…” The trench knife sunk into a throat as she fired her .45 single-handed into a stomach. “…behind the stadium…” Another pistol hit the ground and her third and last came out. “…with you, my brown-eyed girl… Wait. Does singing this make me gay?”

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Barnard said, wading in with her Ka-Bar.

She found it surprisingly hard to kill this infected with a knife. She couldn’t seem to get it to stop struggling and it was a woman, not even her size. She suddenly realized that the little bitch really was unbelievably deadly, since in the time it took her to finally stab the infected to death the lieutenant had killed three.

“Stab up , Staff Sergeant,” Faith panted, firing into a belly. “And you might want to use the pistol in contact instead.”

The Ka-Bar slid out of Barnard’s blood-covered rubber gloves and she scrabbled for her pistol as an infected tackled her.

“How can you stay on your feet ?” Barnard snarled as she fired the 1911 into the infected’s chest.

“The same way you get to Carnegie Hall, Staff Sergeant,” Faith said. “I also play a fair trombone.”

The three-man team had finally bailed out of their vehicle and with them wading in they made quick work of the remaining infected.

“Tha’ was a fair dinkum scrum, mates!” Faith caroled as she helped the staff sergeant to her feet. “Fair dinkum an ah! So far you win the prize.”

“Can we get it tonight , ma’am?” Hocieniec asked. “I couldn’t figure out how to kill them from inside the car.”

“Shoot through the window next time,” Faith said. “O— oorah. Staff Sergeant?”

“Ma’am,” Barnard said, bent over and panting.

“This vehicle needs extracting,” Faith said. “Put out security and handle it. I’m going for a walk. Oh, zombies! Zombies, zombies, zombies? There’s a poor little girl all alone and lost in the woods…” She wandered back down the road continuing to call. “Ooo! Ow! I think I twisted my aaankle…”

“Lance Corporal,” Barnard said, still bent over. She straightened up and twisted her neck. “You and Rock take security. Haugen, there should be a tow strap in the back of the five-ton. Hook it up to the car.”

“Aye, aye, Staff Sergeant,” Haugen said.

“Lance Corporal,” Barnard said.

“Staff Sergeant?”

“I’m going to need a shot of that hooch.”

“Aye, aye, Staff Sergeant! Miss Faith is a tad nuts, Staff Sergeant. But you get used to it. Have you met Trixie, yet?”

“Okay,” Sophia said through her mask. They were working in Tyvek suits and air masks to avoid contaminating the interior. “Seal it up. Put fricking rigger tape everywhere and seal it tight…”

Cleaning and securing the five-ton had been a bitch and a half even with the powerful spots of the Grace Tan illuminating the scene. For one thing, the flies that always hovered around fresh kills were all over the place and with all the light they were active. For another there was the wind, which was from the land so it was carrying dust and potentially flu. They had finally just turned the five-ton around so the back was pointed at the Grace Tan and away from the land.

“Staff Sergeant Decker,” Sophia said. “Thank you for your assistance in this.”

The staff sergeant and his sidekick Condrey had, in fact, been of assistance. A pain in the ass but a necessary one. He had insisted on going over every inch with a toothbrush. At one point there had been seven people in the back of the vehicle scrubbing every square centimeter to the staff sergeant’s painfully precise direction. But if it wasn’t perfectly antiseptic, it wasn’t for lack of trying.

“Staff Sergeant, moment of your time,” Sophia said, walking away from the five-ton.

“Aye, aye, ma’am,” Staff Sergeant Decker said, following her over at a slow march.

“This is not for dissemination,” Sophia said. “We are going to have to get seven people from a vehicle into the five-ton without contaminating them or the interior of the five-ton. We then are going to have to drive it back, back it onto the Grace Tan and get them into the container that the Grace Tan is preparing. I’m going to leave that last up to Mr. Walker and the Grace Tan crew. Getting them out of the vehicle, which will be somewhere on the island, and into the five-ton, without contaminating the interior, concerns me.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Decker said, frowning. “What type of vehicle, ma’am?”

“Think an Apollo moon lander,” Sophia said.

“Ma’am…” Decker said, then froze.

“No ideas?” Sophia asked.

“No, ma’am,” Decker said. “No ideas, ma’am.”

“We’ll figure it out when we get there, then,” Sophia said with a sigh. “I’m going to need you and Condrey to accompany me. And we’re going to need lots of plastic and tape I guess. We’ll need to decontaminate the suits again but we’re going to be going onto the Grace Tan in a bit. We’ll get out of them and then suit back up later.”

“Aye, aye, ma’am,” Decker said.

“I’m calling this exercise complete,” Sophia said, pulling off her mask. “Fall into the Tan with Condrey and unrig.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Decker said.

“Soph?” Olga said as the staff sergeant marched back to the Grace Tan .

“Yeah, Olga?” Sophia said. It would be a nice night if it wasn’t for the smell of iron and shit and the occasional burst of fire in the distance. Okay, the fire wasn’t so bad. She really didn’t want to try to extract the ISS crew with infected swarming. On the other hand, she didn’t want Faith getting shot by her undertrained Marines.

“What the hell is going on?” Olga asked. She’d pulled off her mask as well.

“Thanks for waiting till now to ask,” Sophia said with a sigh. “I appreciate you just going along with the madness. The answer is, I can’t tell you.”

“Oh, come on,” Olga said. “What the hell could be that important?”

“Olga, you’re smart,” Sophia said. “Why in the hell would we be thoroughly clearing an entire island while simultaneously preparing a germ-free transport vehicle? Why did we carry a container that was just as thoroughly decontaminated and has an air lock? And when you figure that out, ask yourself why in the hell we’re keeping the reason secret. And until you can answer that one, don’t talk about it, okay? If by tomorrow at noon there’s no apparent reason for all this… Then if you think you’ve figured it out you’ll also understand why we’re just calling it a training exercise.”

“None of that makes any sense,” Olga said darkly.

“Like I said, you’re smart, you’ll figure it out,” Sophia said. “There is a reason. Now keep an eye out for the returning Marines. We can’t fall back onto the ship till my sister gets here…”