After their orientation briefing Samantha, Jose and Rachel went back to the cafeteria to eat dinner together. As they had left the briefing they had been provided with printouts and questionnaires for the purpose of finding out personal information for locating any surviving next of kin and any current job skills that could help them be placed amongst the remnants of civilization. The three didn't talk very much between themselves as they ate and scanned the documentation. No one felt the need to say anything. They all knew as much about each other as they possibly could after they spent so many weeks together.
The state of the world had been a shock to them and none felt like discussing it as they wrapped their minds around the new world they lived in.
Rachel had seemed a little shaken afterwards even more so then the other two. Samantha knew that almost all of her relatives were living in areas now considered dead zones. She looked at the two page list of jobs that she had picked up and frowned slightly as she got to the second page.
"What's wrong Sam?" Jose broke the silence and asked her after seeing the look on her face.
"These jobs they are offering. Everything seems to be construction or security related. Except for this one in bold letters. Agricultural specialist," she said. "What they should really say is farmhand."
"Would make sense, they are going to need to feed everyone and I doubt the U.S.'s infrastructure is any shape to do it," Jose offered.
"Yeah, I see that but what the hell am I supposed to do now? I don't know shit about farming and I couldn't put a spice rack together without help." Her face had now reflected worry and the sense of hopelessness that they had all felt stuck in that building had started to retake its roots in her heart.
"Well then, why not security?" Rachel chimed in. "Can't be all that difficult. Look at these guys in here. They get to hangout around a country club all day."
"You're kidding right? I would be bored out of my mind not to mention if something did happen I would have to face those things again," Samantha replied.
"I think that's something we are going to have to face someday. This is how the world works now. From what they said, we are lucky there are places left that aren't infested," Jose told her. "We are going to have to adapt if we want to survive."
Afterwards they all went back to their rooms to turn in for the night. Their escorts had excused themselves and told them that from now on they could move freely throughout the facility and that if they needed anything further they would have to deal with facility personnel.
Rachel awoke to the sound of alarms sounding in the distance. She jumped out of bed and rushed to get dressed.
Samantha groaned in her bed and sat up and asked, "Rachel? What's going on?"
"I don't know Sam. There are alarms going off somewhere. You hear it?"
"Yeah, I hear it and I don't know what's going on but if something serious had happened I am sure someone would have come and said something by now," she answered the shaken girl.
As if in response to her statement, a loud knock came at the door causing her to jump and gasp.
Rachel hurriedly opened the door to reveal a young man they had seen working around the club before. "Good morning, my name is John. Don't worry ladies. The military is moving out, that's what the alarms are for."
"Why did something happen?" Rachel asked.
"It's nothing to worry about it is just a small…" John was interrupted as the screaming sound of aircraft engines shook the building.
"Doesn't sound like a nothing to worry about situation if the air force is involved," Jose shouted as he became behind the man. "What the hell is really going on? Are we in danger?"
John turned to look at the newcomer and stared at him blankly. Rachel silently hoped that Justin was okay. She wondered what he was doing right now.
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Justin was at that minute standing inside the command tent listening to Alpha call in for air support. His fellow soldiers of Bravo sitting at a desk going over area maps and trying to find good areas where explosives could wreak the most havoc on the approaching horde of Rot.
"This is ridiculous," Sgt Thompson said to no one in particular.
"I know boss, we should be out calling in those strikes," Helem told him.
"True but the other teams don't have any explosive experts like me and Helem," Thurman said flatly. "Something tells me we'll be seeing plenty of action today so calm down all of you.
"Hey guys…shut up a second and listen," Justin said over the rest of them. "Look like Alphas about to hand out some ass whoopings."
The team listened to the radio as Alpha began to radio in coordinates to the artillery and aircraft. "I say again, fire mission 243310…
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Gata watched as the wave of Rot spread out over the stretch of land in front of them. Behind him two A-10 Warthogs flew in. The moans of the Rot were drowned out as the planes passed overhead.
Suddenly but expected, a long whizzing noise sounded above them and Gata and his team stared mesmerized as a long line of red death spat out of the noses of the aircraft. Looking through his binocs, he saw two lines of smoke cut through the ranks of the Rot. What once were people became random body parts flying through the air.
After the first pass the A-10s banked around and turned back toward the horde spread out over a mile. This time after spraying their nose guns at the ground chewing two more destructive lines through the mass of flesh, they armed and dropped a pair of napalm bombs at the front of crowds.
The bombs hit the ground and blew out white hot napalm across the dusty ground spreading itself out creating a large wall of fire between the Rot and the hidden recon team.
As the planes came around again they fired into the crowd once more and released 2 500lb bombs each towards the center of the mass. The bombs exploded throwing out white hot shrapnel outward ripping through dozens of Rot while scores of others were flattened from the shockwave.
Many had caught on fire and were stumbling into one another catching others on fire. After the last pass the A-10s moved off and headed back to Grand Junction for refueling and re-armament. Unknown to the pilots while they had killed a couple hundred of their enemy, many who had been hit or knocked down slowly rose back to their feet and once again stumbled through the flames now in the direction the planes had left.
Gata laid there watching the chaos unfold before him silent and still. As the wall of napalm burned brightly he saw burning figures walking through the flames dropping several feet afterwards. It was not enough. The sheer volume of bodies that surged through the flames began to trample the flames out till they were no longer any threat.
As the team began to call in coordinates for further strikes, the team saw around twenty people break out of the crowd running full speed.
"Sergeant look!" Corporal Richards cried out.
Gata snapped up his binocs and zoomed in on the group of running people. "Shit! Their soldiers."
"Survivors from the outpost? Richards asked.
"Maybe but how did they get through the Rot?" He focused on the lead runner. Holy shit! Shriekers!"
A stream of curses emanated from his team as weapons were cocked and the soldiers began to target the rapidly closing runners.
"Roy, call in a walking barrage between us and the shriekers. Tell the rest of the air support to come in weapons free. Let's try to stop them here and now. Alpha! Open fire the moment any get into range. Don't waste ammo; we are going to need it." Gata finished his orders to his team and readied himself for the battle ahead. Listening to Roy call in the support lifted his spirits. "Maybe we can do this," he thought.
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The badly mauled soldiers ran towards their prey. A glint of light from the recon team's equipment had betrayed their presence to the shriekers. They ran to them not tiring or feeling the massive amounts of injuries made to their once living bodies. One of them cocked its head to the side as if hearing something.
It used to be Major Benson a former officer of the 3rd Ranger battalion. He had been assigned as the commander of the outpost till it was overrun and his garrison of 150 soldiers were swarmed and murdered by the unexpected horde of Rot.
He had been surprised to encounter his aid, now turned shrieker burst into his room and attack him. He had killed the aid but not before being bitten. After he had called Grand Junction for help his heart had stopped and he opened his eyes again a few minutes later with a new purpose in the world. Feed…
The former Major Benson slowed to a stop and still held its head cocked to the side. Suddenly it dove to the ground hands over its head.
Seconds later the screaming 155mm "Firecracker" round released a large number of golf ball sized bomb lets which it ejected at altitude over the target area. Upon ejection each bomb let opens canted 'umbrella-like' fins and floats spinning to earth. The fluttering, spinning fall has the appearance of a butterfly in flight. Upon impact a spring on the bottom of the bomb let reacts, throwing the bomb let back into the air and starting a time delay mechanism. When the bomb let rises back to about 6 feet above the ground the delay expires and the bomb let detonates with an energy slightly less than an M26 frag grenade. The effect is that of a low altitude TOT, delivered by one shell. The bomb lets; exploding in quick succession has the sound, at a distance, of a string of firecrackers.
The multiple explosions went off right in the midst of the shriekers shredding 15 of them into rotten confetti almost immediately. The last four in the back of the group that had kept running were serious damaged to the point that no human alive would have survived and knocked off their feet. The Rot, previously known as Major Benson, catching very little shrapnel, stayed unmoving on the ground.
The second round to hit was a High Explosive round that luckily hit the area in the middle of the last four runners that were starting to get up. The shockwave blew their bodies into pieces scattering them for a dozen feet in all directions.
The last Rot in the group removed his shrapnel ridden arms from around its head and stood up sprinting towards the team shrieking an awful sound.
"Holy shit!" Richards yelled over the sound of the impact. "Did that fucker just take cover?"
"You saw that too? Take that little piece of shit out," Gata shouted.
Richards aimed at the last shrieker with his Barrett putting the crosshairs on the neck of the Rot and fired. He realized his had pulled the shot slightly as the round struck the shrieker in the right shoulder removing the arm and causing it to stumble.
The team watched in amazement as the rot recovered and shrieked then began to run again at the team then turning to the right sharply and then turning again to the left as if zigzagging.
"Is that bastard doing what I think its doing?" Gata asked out loud.
"Your damn right it is," Richards answered him. He fired again leading the closing target missing by an inch.
"Enough of this shit," another soldier called and brought his M-4/203 combo to bear. He filled the 203 attachment and sent an HE round towards a point that the rot was running to. At the last second the creature changed direction and the grenade exploded behind it pushing it forward a bit but nothing else.
The Rot had closed to within 30 meters of the team when the soldier reloaded his 203 and fired again this time at the Rot itself. The grenade impacted three feet from the creature taking one of its legs off at the knee.
"Got you know bitch," Richards said softly and put a .50 round into the shriekers forehead as it sat up cracking open the head like an egg.
"This is some serious shit we need to report," Gata stated. "I never saw any of them do that before."
"How could it do that? It's like it knew what we were doing," Roy commented.
Thinking heavily on the situation Gata had been ignoring the horde closing in on their position until he looked up at the carnage before him. The artillery had been firing constantly since it had started working it way into the mass from the front. Hundreds of bodies lay on the ground unmoving in the center of the mass, but the sides were still moving unhindered and began to sweep around towards the now very visible recon team.
"Pull back to evac zone!" Gata yelled. "Move!" He added. The recon team grabbed their equipment and ran northeast, Roy calling for evac. Overhead 6 more A-10s flew over and went to work, the artillery ceasing to fire.
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Back in the command tent Justin and Bravo grabbed their gear and headed out towards their Blackhawk.
"You here that shit that Roy was babbling about on the radio?" he asked Helem.
"Yeah something about a shrieker trying to evade fire or some bullshit," Helem answered as if in disbelief.
"Yeah but if what he says is true man, they might have encountered a new type of Rot," Justin said.
"Smart Rot that know to evade fire? Definitely would chap my ass," Helem replied.
Thompson threw in the question that silenced them all, "What if they all get smart like that and they can get even smarter?
