Дэвид Уоллес - Island of Fog and Death

He sat back, sipping his tea, and waited for the room to fill with gas.

Something silently began to uncoil in the dark space beneath his chair.

Delta patrol was advancing just to the seaward of The Circle, along the east coast of the island. It consisted of four seasoned SAS troopers, clad in black, armed with C8 carbines and Sig pistols. Aided by monocular night vision gear, they were locating and clearing cottages, sheds and outbuildings. The silence was broken only by the patrol leader’s occasional quiet progress reports. They estimated that they were half way up the coast, when the dark bulk of another cottage loomed out of the fog.

Using hand signals, Delta One indicated that Delta Three should take a supporting position, covering their backs and the spaces on either side of the cottage. Delta Two slipped away through the fog to their left, checking for doors or windows to the side of the cottage, while Delta Four moved in mirror image to the right. Delta One moved up to the front of the cottage and took up position to one side of the front door.

Delta Two’s voice came softly over the personal radio headset to the rest of the patrol. “Clear left. Two windows, both secure. Moving to the rear.”

A moment later, and Delta Four’s quiet voice came through the radio link, with a similar report.

Then Delta Two came back on again. “Clear at the rear. One back door, not locked. Holding by the back door.”

Delta One touched the push-to-talk button on the intra-squad channel, and said, “Three and Four, stack up on me at the front. Two, stand by at the back. The front door is not locked. We’ll count down and breach on three.” He paused while his team mates joined him. “On three. One… Two… Three!”

Delta Two, at the rear, and One at the front door turned the doorknobs simultaneously and thrust the doors open so that they banged against the inside walls. Delta Three pushed through into the hallway and pivoted left, weapon ready, into a bedroom, while Four pivoted right into a sitting room and One moved straight ahead along the hall.

Delta Two called out, “Kitchen clear!”

Four called out, “Room clear!”

Three yelled, “Room clear!”

Finally One shouted “All clear!”

Relaxing slightly, the four men quickly searched the house, finding nothing.

One touched the push-to-talk on the squad leaders’ channel and reported another cottage cleared.

The four exited through the front door. Two started to speak. “Yet more nothing…” Then he almost stepped into the back of One, who had stopped abruptly.

“Softly, lads,” said Delta One and held his hands out in the universal gesture that meant, ‘I am not a threat’. He took a step forward, allowing Two and Three to move out the door and to either side of him. There were two people standing in the front garden facing them just a couple of feet away.

“British Army,” said One. “We’re here to help. Are you hurt at all?”

The two civilians did not reply.

“Are you all right?” Delta One tried again.

“Boss…” said Two, softly, “They’re not all right. They’re casualties.”

The SAS men could see the torn clothing and bloodstains on both of the men facing them.

Suddenly, Four, still behind them in the cottage hallway, heard a faint noise. He started to turn, to look, but all he glimpsed was a wide-open mouth and teeth as someone seized him and bit his face. He managed to exclaim, “What the—!”, before another set of teeth clamped down on his neck and ripped the front off his throat. His attempt to warn his team mates came out as part shriek, part gurgle, and arterial spray jetted out across the wall and the backs of his colleagues’ heads.

Delta One reacted fastest, spinning to face back into the house, with his C8 pressed firmly back into his right shoulder. He was not sure what he was looking at, but he smelled and felt hot blood spray, and knew that Delta Four was in trouble. He sighted and squeezed the trigger in one fluid movement, sending a burst of three bullets into the face of a bloody figure that was reaching out to him. The figure’s head jerked backward and blood, bone and brain matter sprayed the hallway behind it. A second figure rose from where it had been ripping off Delta Four’s face and thrust a hand at One, catching him full in the face. The night vision monocular jabbed into his left eye and a finger caught him in the right, but reflexively, he squeezed the trigger twice in quick succession, sending two groups of three shots into the figure.

Delta Two and Three wasted a fraction of a second turning to look back, and then spinning to face front again. That time was enough for the two figures in the garden to close in and grab the SAS men, pulling them towards their open mouths. Instinct, imbued by training and experience, took over and the soldiers moved with their attackers, throwing them to the ground. Two whipped up his C8 and shot his adversary, while Three used the butt of his weapon to smash his attacker in the head.

Delta One gasped out, “Man down,” and then, “Shit, I can’t see!”

Two and Three turned. While one of them grabbed One and pulled him out into the garden, the other seized Four’s flak jacket and pulled. Suddenly, One’s vision cleared and he shouted, “They’re not down!”

All four attackers were back on their feet, and closing in again.

Three shouted, “Head shots! Fucking zombies need head shots!” His C8 barked out bursts and the head of one of the two in the cottage garden literally exploded.

Delta Two also aimed and fired for the heads of the two coming out through the cottage door. He scored perfect hits. Delta One aimed for the chest of the man in front of him, and emptied the magazine, calling out, “No, head shots won’t do it! Go for centre mass!”

Sure enough, a headless figure was struggling back to its feet in front of Three. Rather than take time to reload his C8, Delta One pulled his Sig Sauer pistol and emptied it into the attacker’s abdomen.

Delta One contacted the command tent. “Command, this is patrol Delta. Hostile contacts, I repeat, hostile contacts. We have a man down. We are withdrawing to the road. Patrol Charlie, please assist.”

As he was talking, shots rang out from Charlie’s position, and after a few moments more, fainter gunshots could be heard to the west, where Alpha and Bravo patrols were also coming under attack.

“Oh shit,” said Delta One to his team mates. “I think that means we’re on our own. Let’s get back to the road where we can see the bad guys coming.”

Steve cautiously moved towards the light that they had seen. As he drew closer, he could make out the dark shape of a building through the fog. He touched the push-to-talk button for the squad leaders’ channel and reported it in. Troy hung back on the road with Amanda, Gus and Tash, covering the rear, while Peri moved closer to the building with Steve. The light was coming from a window, but the rest of the house – a single-story cottage – was dark. They stepped through a gate into the front garden, and Peri hissed in annoyance as she stepped on something soft and slippery. A corpse.

Steve examined the mess on the garden path. There was little more than a pile of bones and a few scraps of flesh, and a whole lot of blood. “Shotgun pellets,” he whispered.

Peri pointed to another patch of gore, where spines and teeth were just about all that was left. “Do those look familiar?” she whispered.

“Snakes,” was the terse reply.

“I think a neighbour infected by a snake must have come calling, and got blasted.”

“There’s not much left of him,” observed Steve.

“More snakes in the grass, then.”