Lucky Number 3

Santa Fe, New Mexico

[I drive up to a café. Outside, sitting alone is Shaun "Fly-Boy" Romero]

So I guess you are wondering why they call me Fly-Boy? Well before the war, I got really drunk one night and, well, thought I could fly.

[He laughs.]

Those were the good days. They were sort of like the 1920's things were going so well, why would we have reason to worry?

[He takes a sip of his coffee.]

There wasn't really any conflict that needed the reserves, so we spent almost every night partying, and everyday we woke up with a hangover. Around that time I was in Colorado, going to college up there.

It was about noon when the news came, three days after the initial outbreak in Denver.

Why did it take so long for word to reach you?

Well the base was many miles from Denver, and other same towns. So that civilins wouldn't bother us and out affairs.

Didn't you have a radio or something?

Well if it wasn't for the party that was being thrown for a whole week we would've heard, which is why when things did get bad, it was primarily our fault.

When we got the news, there was no way to confirm it since we had lost contact with Denver. So thinking something really bad happened (and having no type of command) we sent all of the boys out except for four of us. We had to stay back and watch the base.

We were expecting contact with the boys within a 24 hour time span, so when we didn't receive any contact for three days, we sent our Helli pilot out so he could tell us what was going on. When he got back, he confirmed that there was Zach, that the whole city was over run, and that we had three days time until they reached us.

[He takes another sip of his coffee.]

I mean when he told us this, we started to freak out. How could 5 of us manage to hold back hundreds of Zach? Now don't get me wrong, it was nothing like Yonkers, that was a massacre, and a huge mistake on the governments part, but this was out fault.

So what did you do?

Well we spent that whole time preparing for the onslaught, we made this test bunker as our last resort, but we thought we had the advantage, higher ground, we wouldn't need it. Then again we were expecting them to hit in the day time. So when they showed up at night, they go us by surprise. We lost the pilot and our "Heavy" within the first five minutes. The two other guys and I had no choice but to fall back.

We got surrounded way to fast, and they completely took over the base. We had to live in that fucking bunker for days, we had enough supplies in there to last ten people a year, so we didn't have to worry about food, and we were good on ammo also.

So after what seemed like months of constant moans, and banging from them trying to get in, we had had enough.

Is this when you…

Yeah, we decided that we either wait for them to finally bust down the door and eat us, or go out with a bang. So we decided that if we were going to die, why not take as many Zach as we can with us.

We loaded up on supplies in case we did make it, and busted out guns flaring. In what seemed like minutes, we had managed to take back the entire base. We paid for that in the end of course. It was revealed to me that my two friends had both sub-stained bites from the conflict, so I had to dispatch them, hardest thing I have ever done in my life, dispatching a friend.

So then what did you do?

well I secured the base, and waited. Back up came three days later on March, third.

[He laughs.]

I guess that my lucky number is three.

[Shaun was the only survivor of the attack on his base. He has since retired from the military, and moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico.]