Stephen Knight: Left With The Dead

Exhaustion hit him suddenly, and Gartrell slowly pulled off the remainders of his gear. His web belt and his MP5 went under the bed, while the radio and knapsack and the contents of his pockets went on the bureau. He would take a full inventory of his meager possessions when the sun came up. But for now, he needed as much sleep as he could get. He stretched out on the bed fully clothed and stared into the blackness, listening to the sounds of the building and the city beyond. The artillery continued exploding in the distance. Gartrell figured the 10th Mountain Division or whoever was launching the attack was going for pure neutralization fire. He hoped the arty would be effective against the zeds, but knowing them as he did, he rather doubted it.

And with that cheery thought in his head, Gartrell fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

###

When he awoke, it was daytime.

At first, he couldn’t remember where he was. He looked about the small bedroom, blinking against the dim light that filtered past the window shade. He saw his gear lying on the bureau next to his head-his radio, his web belt, the grenades, magazines of ammunition, his knapsack, flares, bottled water, white plastic quick ties, paper bags with the Starbucks logo on them-and wondered how it all got there. Then he remembered the woman from the night before, the one he had met in the blacked-out Starbucks, the one who had been prowling through the store looking for lemon cake. He sat up in the bed and listened, but the apartment was quiet. He checked his watch. 9:37am. As Gartrell swung his legs over the edge of the bed, he was struck by something else.

The artillery barrage had stopped.

That could have happened for several reasons, one of them being the arty emplacements had been overrun by the walking dead. Or they had run out of ammunition. Or the advancing echelons of the dead had been destroyed, though he thought that unlikely. Or the artillery batteries were repositioning, or had ceased fire so other units could move in and secure the zone…

Enough guessing. Let’s see what we can find out.

He donned his radio headset and switched on the transceiver. He scanned through the channels, and was overjoyed to discover several frequencies had become operational. He announced himself on them using his mission call sign, but he received no response on the first two frequencies he tried.

The third time was the charm, however. On another frequency, he captured someone’s attention.

“Call sign Terminator Five, this is Summit Three-Seven. Say again, over.”

“Summit Three-Seven, this is Terminator Five. I’m solo in New York City after a busted mission on the Upper East Side. What’s the situation in the world? Over.”

“Terminator Five, this is Summit Three-Seven, a command and control element with the two-eight-seven infantry. This is an operational frequency for the Summit battalion. You sure you’re in the right place? Over.”

“Summit Three-Seven, Terminator Five. I was part of an alpha detachment that went tango uniform about twenty-four hours ago. My frequencies are dead, because there are no other SOF units in the zone. Looks like you lightfighters are all I’ve got. If you have another frequency I can roll to, give it to me and I’ll give it a shot, over.”

Another voice came over the radio. “Terminator, this is Summit Six. Give me your name and unit, over.”

Gartrell’s spirits rose slightly. He was now speaking to the commander of the Summit Battalion, which he knew to be the Second Battalion, 87th Infantry, a tenant unit of Fort Drum and part of the 10th Mountain Division. The infantry battalion CO would be lieutenant colonel, maybe someone with enough horsepower to get something done about his situation.

“First Sergeant David Gartrell, current senior NCO, Echo Company, First Battalion, First Special Warfare Training Group at the Swick. Was pulled out of my normal duty position and assigned to Operational Detachment Alpha OMEN on an emergency basis, over.” Before deploying into the field with Major Cordell McDaniels, Gartrell had been a trainer of Special Forces soldiers, posted at the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School, Fort Bragg, North Carolina. For ease of communication among peers, the name had been shortened to simply SWCS, or more informally, ‘Swick’.

“Terminator, Summit Six. You say you’re a trainer at the Swick, that correct? How’d a trainer get into the field? Over.”

“Summit, Terminator. Long story, Six. But here I am, and I’m wondering if you guys might be able to give me a hand, over.”

“Terminator, this is Summit Six. Listen, we have our hands pretty full at the moment. I’ll try and find a Special Forces liaison to talk this over with, but we have several synchronized movement to contact ops underway right now. You probably know better than we do, but these things are damned hard to kill, over.”

“Summit, Terminator. You got that wrong, Six, they’re easy to kill-you just have to hit them in the head to put them down for the count. Nothing else works, not even major deboning injuries, unless you blast them to pieces. And listen, you need to watch out for something. Ninety-nine percent of those things are brainless, but some of them can come back with skills. We were shagged by members of our own ODA, and they still knew how to use guns and get their stalk on. Let me know if you got that. Over.”

There was a long moment of silence, and then the infantry commander came back on the air. “Uh, Terminator Five, this is Summit Six. Understand you just said that some of the zeds can conduct…coordinated offensive operations, is that correct? Over.”

“Summit, Terminator. Roger that, you are correct. Certain zeds can retain pre-existing high-level skills, though they are not one hundred percent mission capable. But they can operate weapons and machinery-we had stenches roll up on us in a taxi cab and open up with assault rifles. I would advise you to make the appropriate notifications. Over.”

Summit Six didn’t sound thrilled at the prospect. “Roger that last, Terminator.”

“Summit, what can you do to help me out here? Terminator’s single gun with two civilian noncombatants, and it feels like we’re in the middle of stench city. Do you have any aviation assets you can send my way? Over.”

“Terminator, Summit. Negative, we have zero airlift, only attack. All our transport assets were surged down to participate in the evacuation op you must have been part of. We’re trying to get into Central Park to recover some airframes, but that’s going to take a while.” Gartrell grunted to himself as Summit Six spoke. He knew all too well that dozens of helicopters, from small scouts to massive medium lift helicopters that could carry upwards of 50 troops were on the deck in Central Park. The assembly area had been overrun by stenches that had broken through the various cordon sanitaires set up throughout the city. It had been obvious then that the military brass calling the shots had underestimated the sheer mass the horde could bring to bear.

“How long can you hold out at your current pos, Terminator? Over.”

Gartrell rose and walked to the window. He slowly peeled back some of the tape that held the window shade in place and peered out into the bright day, squinting against the harsh sunlight. The street outside-Second Avenue-was full of abandoned cars. At the corner nearby, where East 86th Street intersected with the broad avenue, a roadblock had been set up with New York City snow plows. It had been overrun a day ago, and judging by the amount of brass cartridges that twinkled in the sunlight, it had been some fight. The rains of the preceding night had washed away most of the blood, but Gartrell saw strips of cloth, shoes and boots, and fallen weapons lying on the street.