These Dead Lands (Book 2): Desolation Read online

  THESE DEAD LANDS:

  DESOLATION

  by

  Stephen Knight and Scott Wolf

  © 2019 by Stephen Knight and Scott Wolf

  DRAMATIS PERSONAE

  The Soldiers

  Captain Philip Hastings: Commanding officer of A Company, 1st Battalion, 87th Infantry, 10th Mountain Division (Light Infantry) assigned to Task Force Manhattan. Call signs: Crusader One One/Lakota One One

  Sergeant First Class Carl Ballantine: Surviving senior noncommissioned officer, A Company. Call signs: Crusader One Seven/Blackfoot One Seven

  Staff Sergeant Hector Guerra: Noncommissioned officer, A Company. Call signs: Crusader One Two/Apache One Two

  Sergeant Apollo Hartman: Light infantryman. Call signs: Crusader One Two Alpha/Blackfoot One Two Alpha

  Sergeant Mike Reader: Light infantryman. Call signs: Crusader One Two Bravo/Lakota One Two Bravo

  Private First Class Craig Stilley: Light infantryman. Call sign: Apache One Three Alpha

  Private Jay Tharinger: Light infantryman. Call sign: Apache One Three Bravo

  Kay Ballantine: Ballantine’s wife

  Josh Ballantine: Ballantine’s eldest son, age 9

  Curtis Ballantine: Ballantine’s youngest son, age 7

  Diana Li: Former stripper, one of the survivors of the zombie outbreak in Boston

  Kenny: Autistic boy, age 6

  MSG Slater: Special Forces NCO from 7th Special Forces Group, survivor from Task Force Boston. Call sign: Papa Zero Three

  Senator Henry Cornell: Former lightfighter who is currently the Senate’s president pro tempore. COG designate

  Melissa Cornell: Cornell’s wife

  Colonel David Victor: O-6 with one of the 101 Brigades, now ground force commander at FITG. Call sign: War Eagle Six

  Command Sergeant Major Oratious Parker: Victor’s senior noncommissioned officer

  Colonel Alex Jarmusch: Garrison commander at Fort Indiantown Gap, senior member of the Pennsylvania Army National Guard. Call sign: Hatchet Six

  Captain Chan: MP officer

  Lieutenant Munn: Pennsylvania Army National Guard officer and Train Engineer

  Major “Pontiac” Bonneville: Staff officer serving under Colonel Victor’s command

  Lieutenant Colonel Efstratios Gavas: Cavalry unit commanding officer

  Lieutenant Colonel Herbert: Victor’s Executive Officer

  Command Sergeant Major Willis Headley: Jarmusch’s senior noncommissioned officer

  Major Gaylord: Pennsylvania Army National Guard staff officer

  Sergeant Trevor Martin: Cavalry soldier

  Captain Amar Bellara: Pennsylvania Army National Guard infantry company commander. Call sign: Lance One Six.

  First Lieutenant Brenda Robinson: Bellara’s executive officer. Call signs: Lance One Five, Crusader One One Alpha.

  First Sergeant Weider: Bellara’s senior NCO

  Specialist Corey Jones: MRAP driver

  Staff Sergeant Ron Drecker: NCO commanding MRAP Romeo One Five

  Specialist Tarrant: Soldier assigned to Romeo One Five

  Specialist Gerber: Soldier assigned to Romeo One Five

  Private First Class Weaver: Soldier assigned to Romeo One Five

  Lieutenant Colonel Harry Gottlieb: Commander of Site R, formerly with 7th Special Forces Group

  Bill Everson: Retired gunnery sergeant, US Marine Corps

  Jacob: C-RAM software engineer

  Scotch Billings: Train engineer

  John Mosby: Civilian survivor, possible freedom fighter/terrorist. Name believed to be a pseudonym

  Margaret Mason: Small town mayor

  Mitchell: Civilian survivor

  Ronny: Civilian survivor

  “Extinction is the rule. Survival is the exception.”

  — Carl Sagan

  Darkness, the kind that only the dead must know. A familiar sound. The sound a .50-cal makes as the charging handle is pulled back to load the weapon. The rhythmic clacking of a train as it goes down the tracks. Rhythm, movement, the sound of children laughing. A backyard, familiar, my backyard. My boy laughing, there he is, playing on the swing set. It’s summertime, and my boy Scotty knows how to get his fun on as he charges toward the swing set and lands on one of the seats on his belly. Arms and legs extended, he’s Iron Man, blasting across the sky.

  Then Terry’s face, inches from mine, so close, I can feel the heat of her breath. I’m on top of her, we’re naked, and I’m making love to her. I can feel myself inside her, familiar, warm, wet, a clenching feeling around my manhood. She spreads her legs wider and a fire begins to build inside me. She moans, then rolls me over, she’s on top, the clenching, the building feelings are growing stronger. I run my hands up her body to her breasts, they feel good. I brush her nipples with my thumbs, she moans. She grinds her pelvis forward and backwards on me, slowly, rhythmically, slowly gaining in speed. Faster, harder now, I know what is going to happen, I feel the build-up in me, it’s going to happen. I feel her start to climax and I open my eyes as I start to come, I want to see her. I open my eyes and it’s Diana, naked, beautiful, my hands on her large breasts. Diana continues to rock her pelvis forward on me, confusion, panic, I can’t stop. Diana looks down and gives me a wicked grin, we climax together, bliss, ecstasy, release, no stopping, it feels so good. Diana continues to rock fore and aft, still smiling wickedly down at me. I can’t believe what’s happening, Diana grasps my hands and squeezes them and her breasts hard. She laughs, I want to say something. Diana’s right hand is now in a fist beside her head, what is she doing? Diana comes down with a crushing right hand that hits me in the jaw, I see stars, is my tooth loose? I hear Diana’s fading laugh.

  I open my eyes, they are blurry, I try to focus on the object in front of me, hazy, familiar, getting clearer. My ears are ringing, commotion all around, disorientation, something is burning. Eyes are getting clearer, why am I on the ground? I can see now. I see Specialist Hanson, he’s yelling at me, what is he saying? Hanson is dead, he died in Iraq, why is he here? Am I in Iraq? We stumble out of what is left of a Bradley. It’s in flames, parts of the vehicle are everywhere. Did we hit an IED? As I stumble out of the Bradley’s wreckage and look around, trying to make sense of everything, Hanson is gone. The dry, dusty landscape of Iraq vanishes, replaced by humidity and leafy green trees. I’m back at Indiantown Gap, I’m at the perimeter, reekers are in the wire. Kenny sits on the ground in front of me. He’s eating crackers with Jalapeño cheese, he doesn’t see the reekers behind him as they thrash about in the razor wire, not caring that they’re tearing themselves to shreds. Kenny looks up at me and smiles and asks me if I want some of his delicious hot cheese. His voice is light, almost a whisper. I don’t know why, but that seems like the appropriate thing to do. I sit down with Kenny and he hands me a Meal Ready to Eat cracker with Jalapeño cheese spread on it. I take a bite, it tastes good. Why didn’t we do this sooner? I like Kenny, and I put my hand on his narrow shoulder. He’s skinny, this kid, but he’s going to grow into a big man, I feel it. Then darkness, Kenny ascends into the black, swirling, and my mind is foggy. But the darkness is receding. There’s a rushing noise in my ears. The darkness suddenly lifts, and I open my eyes.

  Hastings came to in the front of the MRAP and looked around. How long had he been asleep? When looked down at his watch, he found it’d been an hour.

  “Fuck,” he muttered.

  The MRAP driver looked over at Hastings and smiled. He was just a skinny, geeky kid whose uniform looked too big for him. “You okay, sir? You looked like you were dead over there. Thought you were going full-on reeker.”

  “Yeah. I’m good,” Ha
stings replied. “I thought I told you to wake me up in thirty minutes?”

  The MRAP driver sensed Hastings wasn’t happy and he returned his eyes to the road ahead. “I was to wake you at thirty minutes as ordered, sir. But Sergeant Slater told me to give you another thirty. He said you needed the sleep and that he’d keep an eye out for you.”

  Hastings was pissed but knew it wasn’t the driver’s fault. Slater carried a lot of weight, and it would take a special soldier to ignore what he said. Hastings struggled, but he couldn’t recall the driver’s name; he was still in a bit of a fog after waking up. And what was that dream? He’d have to unpack that later when he had some time to think about it more.

  “Don’t sweat it,” he told the driver. “It felt like it was only ten minutes.”

  The driver bobbed his head. “I hear that, sir.”

  Hastings knew he could probably sleep for the next twenty-four hours straight if he had that luxury. If there was one thing Hastings had learned while in Ranger school, it was that a human being could go for a long time with minimal sleep and food, but that took a mighty toll on the body. That would lead to mistakes, and leaders could sometimes forsake getting enough sleep in order to stay on top of things if they weren’t careful. If a leader was lucky, he had good NCOs there to tell him to catch some Zs and that there would be plenty of war left for him when he woke up. Hastings knew Slater was looking out for him and recognized Hastings would need all the sleep he could get, when he could get it.

  Hastings still couldn’t remember the driver’s name for the life of him. “What’s your name again? Sorry, I’m blanking out here.”

  “Specialist Jones, sir. No need to be sorry, you have officer shit to keep track of.”

  “Where we at, Jones?”

  “Sir, we’re still headed southwest on 174. Old York Road, just on the other side of Boiling Springs.”

  The convoy had left the Naval Support Activity along Main Street to the west since Interstate 15 was too heavily congested with abandoned vehicles. A drive that would have normally been an hour and change would now take considerably longer as the column would have to rely on the small back roads that meandered across the countryside. The lost time was a tradeoff with the advance having the lowest probability of the convoy running into any trouble that they couldn’t handle.

  Like ten or twenty thousand reekers.

  “We’re coming up on the next phase line, sir,” the driver continued after a moment. “Intersection of 174 and 34 South to Mount Holly Springs.” He pointed at the GPS nav screen mounted in the dashboard. “In about four miles or so.”

  Hastings looked at the screen and quickly located where the convoy was currently positioned. They were on route and making relatively decent time. He looked out the thick window beside him. The countryside looked calm, normal. Stands of trees and rolling, open fields that looked untouched by infection. It was a welcome change from the hell in a handbasket and chaos that they had just left behind at Fort Indiantown Gap. It felt like a Sunday ride in the country, except in an MRAP with a full combat load out. Hastings snapped out of it and reminded himself he still had shit to do. He twisted around in his seat and peered into the back of the MRAP. The troops in back had all nodded off, heads lolling.

  Well, except for one.

  “Slater, you mind coming up here for a second?”

  Slater made his way toward the front of the vehicle. Carrying as much as they could, the already narrow vehicle interior was made even narrower with the addition of food, water and ammo. Slater picked his way across the supplies and slumbering soldiers, bracing himself against the rolling vehicle’s swaying.

  “What’s up, Phil?”

  Hastings was still unaccustomed to being addressed by his first name, but it was something Slater did whenever the two were alone—and apparently, someone as insignificant as a specialist driving an MRAP qualified as being alone. Slater would always call him “sir” if others were around or within earshot. Even though it made him a bit uncomfortable, Hastings nevertheless appreciated the casual professionalism Slater exhibited. In the beginning, Slater’s demeanor had made him and Hastings’s lightfighters uncomfortable; the Special Forces master sergeant had a directness to him that was completely unfiltered. Over the days and weeks they had served together, Hastings had come to recognize that Slater was merely the embodiment of a Quiet Professional. It took some time to warm up to him and his blunt persona, but once you were past that, Master Sergeant Slater was a standup guy. And his penchant for addressing a superior officer by his first name made for friendlier exchanges when they were by themselves and helped get things done.

  “Thanks for the extra thirty minutes of rack time,” Hastings said. “It really hit the spot. Good call.”

  “No sweat. You were looking like smashed dog shit, and it’s been quiet since we kicked off. Besides, can’t have you crashing on me when shit goes south. You feeling better now?”

  “Right as rain. Good to go.”

  Slater nodded. “Good deal—what I was hoping to hear. All’s good with War Eagle and Eagle One when I did the last commo check. No issues reported since kickoff. We’ll probably need to make a stop along the way at some point and let people take a break and empty their piss bottles, but we can anticipate that.”

  Hastings suddenly felt the urge to take a piss upon hearing Slater mention it. He’d be filling up a bottle of his own here shortly.

  “We’re coming up on the next phase line. Let’s see what pans out when we hit Mount Holly Springs. If everything is relatively secure there, we’ll call for a halt.”

  Slater suddenly seemed to notice Specialist Jones for the first time. “Ah, sounds good to me, sir. I’ll let the rest of the convoy know. I’m sure they’ll be glad to hear it. Anything else?”

  Hastings shook his head. “Nope. Good to go here.”

  Slater picked his way back to his seat and picked up the radio handset. Hastings faced forward and scanned the terrain ahead before he glanced at the nav system on the dash. They were coming up on their turn.

  “Okay, Jones. Keep an eye out, we’re about two hundred meters from our turn. We’re looking for 34 South to Mount Holly Springs.”

  “Roger, I think that’s it up ahead, sir, at the traffic light.” Jones took his foot off the accelerator and let the MRAP slow as he leaned forward, peering out the thick windshield. “Yep, there’s the sign to Holly Springs and 34 South.”

  “Take it light, Specialist. Eyes out.”

  “Count on that, sir.”

  ###

  The long train roared down the tracks at fifty miles per hour, its great locomotives generating a combined output of almost twelve thousand horsepower as their gigantic diesel engines consumed the equivalent of a twelve ounce can of Pepsi every few seconds. Like all guys, Sergeant First Class Carl Ballantine was interested in anything that had an engine in it, especially if that engine was the size of a small car. While he hadn’t been able to watch the engineers start up the locomotives, he’d chanced a glance inside the engine compartment from the narrow catwalks that than alongside the titanic machines. Even with hearing protection, the racket coming from the twelve-cylinder electro-diesel engine was almost deafening. But it was also cathartic. Being next to so much raw power was somewhat exciting.

  More exciting was that the train was reputed to be virtually invulnerable to zombies while moving. A gaggle of a hundred or so had gathered on the track ahead, drawn to the consist by the roar of its throbbing GE engines. As they mostly shuffled toward the approaching train, Ballantine worried that he and the troops had no real ability to fire on them. There was a catwalk on the front of the engine, which soldiers could access from a door in the machine’s nose. But that would truly be shooting John Wayne style.

  “Hey, what happens if we hit those things?” Ballantine asked the engineer, sitting in his chair on the right side of the cab. It wasn’t Munn, the National Guardsman who had originally assisted with procuring the engines. This was a burly civi
lian with salt and pepper hair and a big beer belly.

  “We won’t even slow down,” the engineer responded. “We’re hauling over five hundred tons of cars and cargo. Could get kinda messy, though.”

  “You want us to shoot them?”

  The engineer waved the question away. “Hell, no. Save the bullets. Watch this.”

  “Ah, watch what?”

  The engineer glanced back at him, lips curling upward in a faint smile. “Watch what happens when about five hundred tons of speeding locomotives hits organic matter at”—he glanced at the displays before him—“fifty-one miles per hour.”

  Ballantine returned to the left side of the cab, where the assistant engineer sat. He leaned over the guy’s chair and grabbed onto it with both hands as the zombies willingly advanced toward their fate. The lead locomotive loomed over them for a moment, then plowed right through them. Most of the reekers just disappeared, as if they’d never been, save one. Ballantine watched that lone body fly through the air, arcing away to the left as it bounced off the locomotive’s nose. It cartwheeled through the air like a child’s toy, arms and legs outstretched, albeit at angles that were quite odd—clearly, almost every bone in the ghoul’s body had been smashed to pieces. It flew on for a good fifty feet before slamming to the grassy field beside the tracks. It rolled along for a few dozen yards, disintegrating as it went. Ballantine heard no sound of impact, and felt nothing as the locomotive charged right over the herd.

  “Wow, didn’t feel a thing,” he said. He knew he was smiling like an idiot, but there was no helping it. It was awesome to watch the zombies get obliterated and not have to raise a finger to do anything to bring about such a satisfactory conclusion.

  “Yeah, it’s gonna take a lot more than zombies standing on the tracks to get us to stop,” the engineer said. “I am worried about track conditions, though. Would’ve been great if the Army could have scouted the rails, make sure we’re not going to run into a bottleneck somewhere.”