Ladies and Gentlemen:
Trapped
in purgatory
a lifeless object, alive
Awaiting reprisal
Death
will be their acquisition
The beating of the rotor blades filled my ears. The smell of smoke and fire filled my nostrils and lungs.
"One minute till landing" came the call over the intercom in my headset. I raised one finger to the 10 other men in the cabin of the UH-60 Blackhawk helicopter.
I thought back onto the past few months, and how fucked everything had become. How the world went to shit in less than 3 weeks, and mostly about how a man like me could be working for free.
My name is Dan. That's all you need to know other than my call sign, Harvest of Sorrow, or just Sorrow. I'm not a soldier, or a sailor, or a marine. I'm a merc. A soldier of fortune if you will. I was dressed much differently than the 10 other men in the helicopter. In fact, everyone was dressed a little differently for this little search and rescue mission. I for one was dressed in Multicam, with a full kit. Kneepro kneepads, Multicam CIRAS vest, hell, even some parts of my weapon were Multicam. I loved my weapon, a custom made Tactical Side Folding stock M68 with a body that I got custom made before the Fall in commemoration of my unit, Delta Force.
Everyone else was dressed in either black SWAT uniforms in the case of two of them, and the rest were wearing just civilian clothes, from jeans to business slacks, with tactical vests or chest harnesses. They all had M4's similar to mine, although they did not shoot the 6.8 millimeter SPC round. It was kind of sad how the only people the military had left to spare for SAR missions were civilians and a few former cops.
The
sky is turning red
Return to power draws near
fall into me, the
skies crimson tears
abolish the rules made of stone
I looked out the side of the helicopter and saw them below, thousands of them, the Plagued some people called them. I just called them zombies. No one wanted to believe that though. I couldn't change what they believed just because I wanted to. As we flew low and fast towards the distress beacon I could feel the helicopter slow down to a crawl, eventually slow enough that we could see the ruins below us. What used to be Columbus, Georgia was now nothing but rubble and fire. The US Army at Fort Benning nearby constantly shelled and bombed the city in order to contain the localized infection, but it only worked insofar as burying thousands of the infected and trapping even more people in the city.
Pierced
from below, souls of my treacherous past
Betrayed by many, now
ornaments dripping above
As the helicopter slowed down and flared, I leaned forward slightly and motioned for the fastropes to be dumped out of the sides of the helicopter. The SWAT guys went down first, and as soon as they hit the ground they set up 360 degree security at the corners of the courtyard we had been dropped into. I went next and took a quick look around during my 3 second fastrope decent. I saw nothing but a red sky, signaling rain, and thought about how we would get picked up along with whatever survivors we found before darkness fell and the infected started to swarm our final position.
I ran forward towards the northwest corner of the courtyard and posted up. Straining my eyes and ears for any sign the infected were on their way towards us. Intelligence on the area was sketchy at best, and not even good at worst. I had no idea where the infected were in relation to my current position, nor even where I was. All I knew was that about a quarter mile west of where I was now, there was a distress beacon going off, and it had just come up.
The other eight civilians all followed suit and quickly we had a perimeter established, with fire lanes and the works. This place, a small courtyard in the western edge of the town would serve as our rally point in case shit went FUBAR and where we could go for emergency pickup in the event everything went to shit.
I hoped it wouldn't.
Awaiting
the hour of reprisal
your time slips away
"Hey, Dan…" came a voice from behind me, I quickly checked and saw one of the SWAT guys waving me over to him. I whistled sharply at one of the four civilians at the southwest corner of the courtyard to bring a buddy with him and watch my point. As he and his friend, both guys in business slacks who also happened to look a lot older than they should, ran over to where I was, I jogged at a crouch to the SWAT trooper, a guy whose nametape said, "Johansen" on it.
"What's the deal Johansen?" I asked as I got over to him. He simply pointed off into the distance to an especially tall and dark pillar of smoke. Not buildings burning, but tires or something with rubber in it.
"It's in the direction we have to head man. That may be them." I narrowed my eyes and studied the pillar of smoke for a few seconds, trying to see Morse code or something in it. I nodded once and said,
"You know this area at all?" Johansen shook his head and gestured to the Northeast corner of the courtyard, where there were four scared looking guys with guns facing outwards.
"Those four are all from this area, I would ask them." I patted his shoulder and he went back to watching his sector as I crouch-ran towards the small group. As I got closer they all stared at me and weren't watching their sectors. I made a hand gesture similar to a salute that meant 'Keep Watching that way,' and only one of them understood and went back to watching his corner. As I got closer I said,
"When I make that hand signal, you watch the direction I'm looking. Got it?" The nearest guy, some mechanic who looked to be in his mid-30s, nodded and went back to watching his part of the corner as well,
"Do you know this area at all?" I asked the last man who was still staring at me. He was about 27, and I think he was an accountant or something for a bank. I wasn't sure, nor did I care at that point. He nodded though and asked me,
"I've lived in Columbus all my life, why?" I gestured towards the column of smoke and said,
"See that column of really dark smoke about a quarter a mile away?" He nodded and I continued, "What's over there?" A look of thought crossed his face for a moment, and he finally said,
"I'm pretty sure that's the stadium over there."
"What's the fastest way there? We don't have much time before nightfall and I don't want to be stuck out here in the dark." I said to the kid.
"We would have to jump on the freeway to get there fast. It goes right next to it and I think there's a ramp that leads down into a freight parking lot." The kid replied.
"How long is that route on foot?" I asked him again.
"Well, the freeway is about a 2 minute walk that way," the kid pointed down a path that I saw headed into a parking lot and what was presumably a rest station, "Then from there it's about a quarter mile, so I would say 15 minutes maximum."
I put my hand up under the sun and counted the number of fingers between it and the horizon. About 3 fingers, so an hour and a half before the sun went down over the highest point under it from where we were.
It sounded easy; 15 minutes to get there, 20 minutes to check it out, 15 minutes to a half hour to get back, depending on how many survivors, if any, we found. Hell we may even be able to get the chopper into the stadium directly, saving a lot of time.
Raining
blood
from a lacerated sky
bleeding its horror
creating my
structure
now I shall reign in blood!
I gathered up the guys, and made a tight perimeter. I briefed everyone on the situation and course of action. Hit the freeway, move as quickly as possible to the stadium, check it out and see what is in there, the await pickup either at the stadium or at the, 'Alamo,' as we had now decided to call the courtyard. I hopped onto the radio net and called in to the helicopter orbiting around the area,
"Raven Six, this is Sorrow. We are Irene. I say again, we are Irene."